


Inside Secure Walls

by 09cityskylights



Series: The Manifesto of Mickey Milkovich [1]
Category: Shameless (US), gallavich - Fandom
Genre: Character Development, Counselling, Dreams and Nightmares, Escape, Fear, Frustration, Fugitive, Gallavich, Gangs, Gay Male Character, Hope, Inner Perspective, Inspired by Shameless (US), Letters, Loss, Love, Love Letters, M/M, Mexico, Mickey/Ian - Freeform, Missing him, Non-Traditional Manifesto, Novella, On the Run, Pain, Prison, Reunion, Revelations, Risking It All, Series, Sexual Scenes, Shameless, Something a little different, Violence, Waiting, deeper understanding, manifesto, short novel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-29
Updated: 2017-05-12
Packaged: 2018-10-25 10:46:56
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 13
Words: 23,146
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10762689
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/09cityskylights/pseuds/09cityskylights
Summary: Part One of the Manifesto of Mickey Milkovich Series: Inside Secure WallsMickey didn’t have an easy life in prison. It was frustrating, and lonely. He missed Ian every single day, but he gained perspective as new people entered his life, and found a way to keep going.Youtube Teaser Trailer for this fic https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J7yeU8FfmEU&feature=youtu.be





	1. Inmate #99843

 

A low buzzing.

Muffled voices.

Blurry faces.

That’s all that managed to penetrate into Mickey Milkovich’s absent mind during his trial, while he sat numbly beside his state appointed lawyer, the tall, youthful, and extroverted Daniel Simmons.

It was a relatively straight-forward trial, and it had been moving along rather quickly so far, with Mickey’s lawyer and the judge doing the majority of the speaking.

The long rows of benches were almost entirely empty, no friends or family were present in the court. Mickey didn’t ask anyone to show, and no one had offered to.

No one had ever come to any of his previous trials back when he was in his Juvie days either, but it didn’t really matter to him.

It didn’t change anything.  

The judge and jury had looked down at Mikhailo Milkovich in his orange jumpsuit, with his tattooed hands joined together in metal handcuffs, in absolute disgust as he was led into the courtroom, minds very likely already made up about his undeniable guilt.

His lawyer suddenly nudges him out his current daze to give a statement, and Mickey admits to drugging Sammi with roofies, and then locking her inside of the moving crate because he thought she was dead. Even though killing her had not been his actual intention, his lawyer hastily reminds him to say.

There really wasn’t all that much to tell, in his mind.

Sammi deserved punishment because she tried to hurt Ian. That’s all there was to it. He of course didn’t mention Debbie’s involvement in the botched plan for revenge.

In his last few days at the Gallagher home, she had started to feel like another little sister to him, as they worked together to get justice for Ian.

He barely looks up during the proceedings following his confession, and half listens to his long list of prior offences and resulting sentences as they are rattled out by the opposing lawyer accusingly, while Mickey stares down at his orange jumpsuit clad knees.

The color reminds him of Ian and he feels his vision start to blur.

His attention only zooms into focus again when the judge makes her final decision, and it rings out clear and harshly throughout the entire courtroom.

_“15 years in Cook County Correctional, with mandatory anger management counselling”._

Mickey’s head finally snaps up from his orange knees and he looks at her with disbelief at first, and then at his lawyer with rage.

“She didn’t actually die!” he hisses, “fifteen fucking years?!”

His state appointed lawyer shrugs nonchalantly, the gravity of Mickey’s situation obviously meaning very little to him.

“It’ll be eight if you behave yourself in prison, nobody serves past 2/3rds of their sentence on good behavior. And frankly, it’s not surprising considering your criminal record, Mr. Milkovich. They want you off the streets for a long time”. He snaps his briefcase shut as he finishes speaking.

The judge and jury begin to file out of the courtroom, clearly pleased with their established decision and ready to return home to their families, while Mickey swivels his dark head around the room, desperately looking for someone, _anyone_ , to say that no, this wasn’t happening. That there had been a mistake.

That this wasn’t real.

Two correctional guards then approach him and order him to stand. He tries to protest but one of the guards jabs him roughly with his baton, saying, “It’s over. Accept it and don’t make things any worse for yourself”.

 

The door to the transport van is opened and Mickey blinks rapidly into the bright sunlight that suddenly floods his field of vision, as he is prodded out of the van first, and onto the asphalt.

He stares up at the massive building looming in front of him while the other inmates who were found guilty that same day are unloaded from the van, one by one, each being told to stand in line behind Mickey.

Cook County Correctional is enormous compared to the Juvenile detention centres Mickey had been to in the past.

It’s bleak and grey, an ugly stained building, with barred windows and tall fences surrounding it, topped with vicious looking barbed wire. 

The guard tells them to advance towards the entrance, each inmate now linked together in chains to keep them from bolting.

Mickey is by far the youngest of the group, something that apparently doesn’t go unnoticed by the other inmates standing behind him in line.

He hears harsh and breathy whispers from behind, but only one is said loudly enough for him to hear it clearly.

“You’re _mine_ short-stuff”.

Mickey, being in chains, can’t look directly behind himself to shoot back anything in return, but says to the unknown speaker loudly as he faces forward, “You can fuck right off”.

One of the guards has heard both comments and ends the conversation sharply.

“ _Quiet in line! No talking_!”

The whispers stop.

 

Mickey is allowed to make one phone call when he arrives inside of the prison after booking, to relay his sentence to a family member, Svetlana as his legal wife being the designated one.

“ _Fifteen fucking years_ ”, he breaths angrily into the phone to her. He glares at the man next in line for the phone, pretty sure that he was the one making the fucking comments earlier.

She sounds almost dismissive of him at first, as if it does not concern her all that much that he will be spending the next eight to fifteen years of his life in prison. “What did you think? Stupid boy sticking long nose where it does not belong”.

Bitch.

Mickey forgets about the man standing after him in line.

“I had no choice and you fucking know that. She went after Ian”, he hisses back into the receiver. He’s gripping it so tightly in his hand that his knuckles are beginning to turn white from the pressure.

Her tone softens slightly as she speaks again, “I bring Yevgeny. We visit in two weeks, _if_ you are allowed”.

He is still fuming though, “Unless you bring Ian, don’t bother. I need to see him”.

She says something back in Russian, sounding exasperated, and then in plain English, “fine”.

The line goes dead and Mickey slams the phone back down into its holder.

“Hey! Take it easy inmate! No damaging prison property”. A tall and lanky prison guard approaches him and then recuffs Mickey’s hands roughly behind his back, before leading him down several long hallways to _Block A_ , and then into his new cell.

“ _Inmate #99843_ , you’re with Jensen for now” the guard says, as he reads from his clipboard, jerking an elbow casually towards the guy already sitting inside, a sickly-looking individual covered in piss poor tattoos of crosses and flames.

Once Mickey is placed safely inside of the cramped 6x8 cell, the guard orders him to stick his cuffed hands back out of the bars again so he can unlock them.

Mickey rubs his wrists when his hands are finally freed, barely noticing the red imprints they had left on his pale skin. “For now?” he asks Jensen with confusion, cocking an eyebrow sharply as he does.

The guy simply shrugs, apparently unfazed by his new roommate. “Turn over rate is pretty high. Most people end up with new cell mates every few months”.

Mickey considers him while he talks, wondering what the fuck _this_ guy is in for. Wonders if he’s some kind of a fucking psycho. Jensen seems to be able to hear his thoughts because he then blatantly says, “Arson. Intentional”. He laughs.

 _Great,_ a pyromaniac, explains the shitty tattoos at least. He’ll just have to out-crazy the guy, so he doesn’t try and fuck with him. “Attempted murder” Mickey says, crossing his strong arms challengingly.

The guy nods with either respect or acceptance, most likely the latter, he assumes.

“Too bad you didn’t get the job right the first fucking time. Leave no witnesses, am I right?” Definitely not respect, but Mickey isn’t ready to pick a fight with him just yet.

The guy doesn’t wait for an answer to his rhetorical question and Mickey doesn’t offer one.

 

Mickey quickly learns that Cook County Correctional is very different from Juvie, in a number of ways.

The number one reason being that the majority of guys in here aren’t some young fuckups who have been handed minor sentences, designed to get them in line while they are still able to be tried as a youth.

No, these are hardened criminals, and multiple time offenders, imprisoned for a wide range of serious offences.

The prison is in much poorer physical condition than his detention centres ever had been, is clearly overcrowded with inmates, and has what seems like very few guards assigned to watch over entire blocks. Gangs are very clearly established in here too, and these guys are lifers, not just some stupid kids mixed up in the wrong crowds.

Mickey knows the unspoken rules of prison, and not belonging to a specific gang means that he will have to sit among a mixed group of European inmates during meal times, as inmates highly segregate themselves by race. Most of them being Russian or Italian, from the looks of it. 

He is close enough to the majority of them, being Ukrainian, and he knows Svetlana has connections with a few of the Russian inmates too. Probably from having blown them at some point before their incarceration, Mickey guesses.

He doesn’t ask for that to be clarified when one of them identifies himself as such during dinner.

He approaches Mickey while he is absentmindedly pushing around lumpy instant mashed potatoes on his tray, wondering what Ian is doing at that very moment. Did someone remind him to take his fucking pills today?

“You Mickey?” he sneers when he reaches the table, tipping his chin towards Mickey’s hand tattoos.

“Who wants to know?” he asks warily, balling one hand into a fist slowly, warningly. He’s been on edge ever since he arrived to this fucking shithole.

The guy cracks his knuckles brutally in response, adding “Viktor”, and then he jerks his head back in the direction of the table he had came from.

Mickey looks.

Viktor appears to be a late to middle aged, slightly overweight man, with silvery gray hairs beginning to salt and pepper his sleek black head. He is surrounded by other Russian inmates, his quiet authority clearly identifying him as their leader.

The guy standing in front of him snaps his fingers in Mickey’s face to get his attention again, “Viktor knows Svetlana. We have deal through her, to you. You service us, we reward you”.

Mickey frowns, “I ain’t doing any gay shit”. He wonders what Svetlana fucking told them. Under no circumstances would he ever allow himself to be passed around like some gay fuckin gang pet.

“Shut the fuck up”, the guy glares at Mickey through bloodshot eyes, as Mickey flips him off, “Not the service you are hired for. You make the messages we give you clear when you extend them to their recipient. Then you are paid. _Capiche_?”

“Yeah sure, whatever” Mickey says, waving one hand slightly away so the guy will leave him the fuck alone already.

“We’ll be in touch”, the guy says with finality, before walking away.

Mickey’s a little pissed off that Svetlana had this arranged without his prior knowledge or consent. It’s not that he’s worried about getting his sentence extended either. There are plenty of ways to make violent threats untraceable by the guards, and nobody wants to be a snitch in prison, so he’s not worried about that. Mainly because everyone here knows that if they do snitch, they won’t even make it through to the next night. If the guards even give a shit in the first place.

But he doesn’t particularly want to beat the shit out of anyone here on behalf of someone else. Then again, what choice does he have? It’s his life or theirs.

That first night in prison it takes Mickey an impossibly long time to fall asleep.

He lays under a scratchy, standard prison-issued blanket, and looks at the concrete wall across from him blankly in the dark, while the sound of hundreds of other inmates sleeping, breathing, shifting, passing gas and jerking themselves off drift throughout the prison.

Like the penitentiary version of crickets.

 

When he finally falls sleeps that night, he dreams he is at the Gallagher house.

He is laying on the floor in the Gallagher boys’ shared bedroom, in a worn out old sleeping bag. He is beside Ian’s bed, where he used to sleep when Ian first returned home from the army. When he didn’t want to miss a single moment with him ever again, but they weren’t exactly reconciled yet either.

It’s hard and uncomfortable being on the bedroom floor in his dream, but he’s content because Ian’s finally back home, and only a few feet away.

That feeling of contentment shatters when he wakes up in the morning and realizes the uncomfortable sensation of the floor is really just the realistic one of his hard bed, transferring cruelly into his dreams.


	2. The Altruistic Criminal

The cafeteria serves lukewarm oatmeal to the inmates that has the consistency of glue for breakfast, and its stringy texture vaguely reminds Mickey of snot, nauseating him deeply. But he knows getting another chance to eat anytime soon is not always guaranteed in prison.  

Mickey can barely swallow the crap down, but eventually manages to, aided by large gulps of water from his plastic cup.

As soon as he is done eating, Mickey is escorted in handcuffs from the cafeteria, and then down several long and empty hallways.

Until he is finally delivered into a somewhat plainly decorated office for his mandatory, “ _anger management counselling_ ”.

He practically throws himself down into the chair across from his newly appointed therapist, a middle-aged man with sharp green eyes, and a clipboard thick with case information placed in front of him.

The severity of his eyebrows rival Mickey’s own.

He looks at Mickey for a moment, who gazes back calmly, and they size each other up.

“You can wait outside of the room”, the therapist eventually says to the guard, his hard stare not leaving Mickey’s challenging one.

The guard hesitates, “Doc, he’s in for attempted murder. It’s not recommended that you be alone with him”. He looks over at Mickey with distrust.

The therapist shifts his gaze away from Mickey and towards the guard, “I’m well aware of his sentence, being that his case is assigned to me. He’s handcuffed. And you being an extra foot closer wouldn’t be very much help in the unlikely event that he decides to try and murder me in my office, now would it?”

He says this all very politely, but there’s a slightly insulting tone buried deep in there somewhere. Mickey warms to the therapist guy just fucking slightly, liking the way that he thinks.

The prison guard frowns but doesn’t argue, and shuffles out of the room to stand guard outside of the closed door. The Dr. taps his brown clipboard as soon as he is gone. “Mikhailo Milkovich. Interesting history”.

Mickey presses his lips together thinly but doesn’t answer.

“Why don’t you tell me about yourself?”

Mickey scowls, suddenly irritated by the fact that he even has to fucking be here. “I don’t have fucking anger issues alright? The bitch I apparently “ _tried to kill_ ”, had it coming. She tried to get Ian arrested! He was sick, and she ratted out her own brother, I’m sure that’s in your fucking file somewhere”, Mickey’s tone is loaded with sarcasm and spite as the words spill out of his mouth.

The therapist licks his lower lip thoughtfully while Mickey speaks, considering every word he says very carefully, and seems completely unfazed by his expletives.

Both of them are rather surprised that Mickey had opened up so quickly, but to be honest he was just too fucking angry to hold out like he had originally planned to.

The Dr. speaks again when Mickey is done, “An _altruistic_ attempted murder, fascinating”.

Mickey sniffs, “The fuck’s that?”

“It means you tried to murder the woman- no, sorry, in your recorded statement it says _torture her_ \- because you felt that she had harmed someone else. Someone you cared about, who couldn’t look after themselves”.

Something about the calm and collected manner in which he relays what Mickey had done, like maybe its not so bad, relaxes Mickey ever so slightly. Still, he hesitates, “…Yeah, so?”

“So, you had nothing to gain from doing that”, the therapist says pointedly.

“I had to gain her bitch ass being taught a lesson” Mickey argues back, disagreeing with the sentiment.

The therapist shrugs his shoulders somewhat, “Maybe. My point is you are unlike most criminals, charged with murder or otherwise, that I speak with”. He looks at Mickey’s file on his clipboard again, “Why don’t you tell me about Ian? It says here he was your partner”.

“IS. IS my partner” Mickey corrects loudly.

“My apologies, go ahead”.

“What’s there to fucking say?” Mickey says, totally taken aback by this fucking conversation. This is not what he had fucking expected for mandatory anger counselling.

He had expected some hippy telling him to breathe and count to ten instead of aiming a fucking fist towards whoever he was pissed off at.

Not someone asking him about Ian.

The doctor clarifies, “What does he _mean_ to you? Why were you willing to torture someone, risk going to prison your _entire_ life, for _him_?” Each significant word is said slowly, the full weight of it being emphasized.  

Mickey swallows hard, wary of why the conversation has gone in this direction. “Ian…Ian’s been sick okay? He couldn’t look after himself, so I fucking did. He has that bipolar thing, so sometimes he does crazy shit”. The therapist listens with rapt attention but doesn’t speak next, obviously waiting for more of an answer to his question.

Mickey raises his cuffed hands in frustration, “So you can explain to them that I don’t have anger issues, that’s not why I fucking did it. So I don’t need fucking counselling, alright? Tell em we’re done here”.

“Listen, Mikhailo-“

“ _Mickey_ ”

“Mickey, that’s not how this works. This counselling is a mandatory part of your sentence. I agree with the sentiment that you don’t need anger counselling because I think you need more than that. If you work with me, my compiled risk assessment of an inmate goes a long way towards not only gaining you privileges during your time here, but also towards your eventual parole meetings. Just so you know. Getting out at eight years is much more plausible with me vouching for you, if I feel that is the appropriate action to take”, he leans back in his chair confidently as he says this.

Mickey is torn between telling the guy to just fuck off already, and knowing that what he says is true. He sighs, and rubs the heels of his cuffed-together hands against his sweaty forehead in irritation.

“Ian is…the most important person in my life. I would do, anything for him”. _There._ Simple enough.

The therapist nods, “Good”.

“Our time is unfortunately up, but we will be seeing each other twice a week during your time here. Your homework is to think more about what he means to you, and why, and to share that with me next time I see you- keeping in mind what I said about your sentence” he says more firmly, not letting Mickey interrupt about doing ‘ _homework_ ’.

Mickey leaves his appointment more frustrated, and confused, than he had even been before, and the guard doesn’t take him back to his previous cell, either.

Instead, he’s now standing in front of another one with a large Mexican man already occupying one of the bunks.

“This ain’t my cell”.

“It is now. That nut-job Jensen got his hands on some matches and tried to light your bed on fire. This is your new cellmate”. He shoves Mickey inside the cell unceremoniously.

“Damon”, the guy says, raising a large hand in greeting as Mickey enters.

Hopefully _this one_ wouldn’t to try to fucking burn him alive.

Mickey nods in response and then adds, “Mickey”.

Damon doesn’t ask what Mickey’s in for and Mickey doesn’t offer to tell.

 

Mickey’s frustration mounts even more over the following days.

He dreams about Ian every single night, vague and blurry dreams where he can never quite see Ian’s face clearly. He starts to wish he had an actual picture of Ian here.

He thinks of the exact place on his bedroom wall where he knows Ian’s picture still hangs, untouched. Crumpled and bent, but still a perfect image.

On a day while Damon is outside of their shared cell during his own free time, Mickey has the entire thing to himself. Until his own primary risk assessment is completed by Dr. Howard, Mickey is not allowed the same privileges that cleared _low-risk for violence_ prisoners are, like free time outside of their cells each day to spend in the rec room, the library, or the yard. Each cell block rotating so there are never too many prisoners loose at one time.

Mickey sits at the small metal table attached to the wall of his cell and tries to draw Ian’s face from memory, so he can have some sort of fucking picture of him here, to at least look at.

The prison had provided him with a few blank sheets of paper to write a letter home, if he wanted to. He takes the pencil from Damon’s things, and begins drawing.

It's useless. He quickly becomes frustrated, and ends up ripping the paper in half in annoyance. He has the memory, but not the artistic skills, to have Ian’s face recreated in front of him. He wants something physical so badly though.

He traces the letters tattooed onto his fingers absentmindedly, until it hits him.

 

He gets Damon to bargain for the needle and supplies from another inmate during his next free period in the rec area, and he then scrapes and pokes Ian’s name into his chest later that same day, with hundreds of sharp jabs.

Each burn felt beautiful to him though, as Ian’s name slowly began to flow across his chest.

His cellmate watches him curiously while he eats from a small packet of pretzels. “Who’s Ian Gallagher?”, he asks, through a mouthful.

Mickey, determined to focus on his work, starts to answer, but then just shakes his head.

He can’t put into words who Ian Gallagher is… what he means to him.

It finally hits him many hours later, as he lays in the dark on his back, unable once more to find sleep.

He whispers softly to himself, “Everything. He’s everything”.

 

He repeats that thought back to his therapist at their next appointment, hoping that’s enough for him.

The doctor seems pleased enough with his effort but still wants more, “Why, Mickey? Tell me why he’s everything”. Mickey shakes his head, searching for the right words.

“I’m… I’m in prison now, okay? But before Ian… even when I was at home, I was in prison. I-“

His voice cracks slightly and he clears his throat firmly before he continues, “I miss him so fucking much. It’s driving me crazy. I literally feel _fucking crazy_ , like I could bash my head against a concrete wall until I don’t think about him anymore”.

Mickey had thought about doing that the previous night, while thoughts of Ian had invaded his exhausted mind constantly, preventing him from getting any sleep.

“Are you at risk of hurting yourself Mikh _\- Mickey_?” the therapist looks up, his bushy eyebrows crammed together in concern at Mickey’s confession.

“What? _No_ , no man. I just mean that’s… how I feel”, Mickey quickly answers. Last thing he needs is to be in the fucking psych ward, stuck in solitary confinement. The doctor nods, accepting his response, “Well I have an idea that may help. Several other inmates in similar situations as yourself have found it as a sort of release…” he waits for Mickey to interrupt, and when he surprisingly doesn’t he continues,

“You write down whatever you would like to say Ian, whenever you feel like it, during the day. You can mail the letters to him and then when he visits, you can pick up from those communications. It makes it feel like less time has passed, for both people”.

Mickey sniffs as if he is uninterested, but he does sort of like the idea of not missing so much in between their visits. “He hasn’t visited yet, he will soon though. I’ll…I’ll think about it”.

The therapist nods again but still pushes him just a bit more, “Would you like it if the roles were reversed, and he did that for you?”

Mickey thinks about what it would have been like if Ian had ended up in this nightmare instead of him, how worried he would have been while he waited back home for him.

It had seemed like that was a very real possibility at one point, when the army had tracked Ian down for desertion. The thought had been terrifying to Mickey. Of Ian being locked away, of Mickey being unable to help him.

“…Yes”.

And there’s Mickey’s answer.


	3. Swinging Like a Pendulum

The intense feeling of relief that washes over Mickey's entire body a week later when his first visitation finally arrives, is almost indescribable.

His first couple of weeks at Cook County Correctional had frankly been fucking awful, as he tried to work himself back into following the strict routines of prison, while also putting up with shit from other it’s other residents, and undertaking Viktor’s dirty work.

While he struggled to get used to sleeping alone again.

At least his therapist had finally given his professional opinion that Mickey was _low risk for violence,_  for the time being at least, and that he was a suitable inmate for access to visitation rights, as well as other privileges, like free time when his block wasn’t in lock-down hours.

Mickey’s relief is even more pronounced when he sees a familiar redhead standing behind Svetlana and Yevgeny, who are sitting at his visitation station, waiting to see him.

He almost fucking reaches out towards Ian from behind the thick glass that separates them. What a fucking relief, he _knew_   they couldn’t be over. Ian must have finally come out of his bipolar-induced mood that had pushed him to say those things in front of the Gallagher home, right before Mickey’s arrest.

Ian is still facing the other way though, so Mickey wiggles his fingers towards Yevgeny as a hello in the meantime, and sits down.

His forced Russian prostitute of a wife presses her lips against the glass seductively once he sits in front of them, as if she misses Mickey indescribably. Her lipstick leaves a messy red print on the glass.

“Say hi to Yevgeny like you care” she prompts. He considers the kid for a moment, still wondering sometimes if Yev is really his son or not. Regardless, he does care about the kid.

“Sup little man, gettin’ big”. Yevgeny gives him a drooly smile in response.

Ian finally turns around and comes over, but instead of taking Svetlana’s place in front of Mickey he simply takes Yevgeny away, without looking at Mickey, and sits at another station behind them.

Mickey taps his foot impatiently. Svetlana begins to bitch about the jobs Mickey is supposed to be doing for Viktor while he’s in here, but he barely hears her, and answers distractedly, trying to rush the conversation so he can fucking talk to Ian already.

He only has so much time.

“He just gonna sit back there the whole time?” he finally asks, watching as Ian bounces Yevgeny affectionately on his knees.

Svetlana follows Mickey’s gaze and looks back behind herself. When the redhead finally looks up and back at them, Mickey raises his hand towards him in confusion.

Instead of answering his question, Svetlana tries to grab his focus again. “Lots more jobs coming in. We make a lot of money with you in here”.

_Jesus Christ._

“Fine, look, why don’t you take the milk sucker and scram? I want to talk to Ian”.

Understatement of the century.

She feigns more gross affection towards Mickey before trading places with Ian, who very slowly comes over and picks up the receiver like he’d rather fucking be just about anywhere else.

Still, it’s so fucking good to see him. It almost feels like this nightmare isn’t so bad, with Ian right there in front of him. “Thanks for comin’ back” he says gently, filled with relief that Ian’s come around.

Inside of smiling at him, Ian tips his head awkwardly. “Yeah. Svetlana paid me, so…”

Mickey feels the smile slide right off from his face. He struggles with how to respond for a moment and then decides to just try and brush right past the stinging comment, “You look good”.

And it was true. Ian always looked good to him.

Ian doesn’t answer, and his green eyes flicker about the room uncomfortably, as if he is unsure how to respond to that. Mickey feels heat on his chest and suddenly remembers,

“I got a new tattoo. Did it myself, hurt like a son of a bitch”. He drops the receiver and pulls down his shirt just enough to show it to Ian, proudly.

“ _Jeesuss_ ”, Ian breaths out with concern, and maybe a little disgust, “It looks fucking infected”.

But he finally has a small smile on his face.

“Kinda hard to round up a clean needle in here” Mickey says jovially, feeling his own smile returning.

“Gallagher’s spelt with two L’s” Ian then says back pointedly.

Mickey looks down in disbelief…had he been that fucking distraught, that he somehow fucked up the spelling...? “ _Noo it’s fuckin not_ …” he groans, staring back, and then down at his bruised chest.

Ian starts to laugh and Mickey looks down at the tattoo in continued disbelief, “ _Fuckkk_ ”.

He looks back up just in time to see Ian’s beautiful smile and quickly forgets about the botched tattoo, but Ian quickly wipes the smile from his face as soon as he does, apparently determined to be serious.

Mickey laughs softly at his expression, “Been thinking bout you. You ever think of me?” His eyes flicker over Ian’s face affectionately. God he fucking missed that man.

There was a time Ian would have answered that question so easily.

Mickey remembers the time back in Juvie that he had to tell Ian to take his hand off the glass, Ian was so happy to see Mickey that he didn’t bother to hide his affection at all. But today he just looks solemn, and uncomfortable.

 In fact, he doesn’t answer at all.

Mickey feels a lump start to form in the back of his throat and he says, “You gonna wait for me?” He feels like Ian will… considering everything they’d been through.

“You’re in here for 15 years”, Ian states blatantly, as if this is his answer.

“Yeah but I’ll be out in 8 with overcrowding so.” Mickey says this quickly, tries to make _eight years_ sound like nothing. Tries to convince himself too, so he doesn’t get himself down.

“You tried to kill my sister”, Ian adds.

The bullshit of that statement suddenly pisses Mickey off, “Half sister, one. Two, like you give a shit? Bitch had it coming, calling fuckin MP’s on you”.

The buzzer sounds loudly, signalling the end of visitation, so while he still has Ian on the phone he presses, now starting to worry, “Will you…? Wait?”

Ian looks everywhere but at Mickey, and that and his silence, seem to be his answer. 

With a sinking heart Mickey almost pleads with him, “Fucking lie if you have to, man. Eight years is a long fucking time”. He looks away, trying to keep any tears from forming in his eyes, but its not easy. He doesn’t know how he’ll get through this, knowing Ian could be out there with someone else.

He hopes something with snap in Ian and he’ll say, “ _Of course_ I’ll fucking wait Mick. Don’t be fucking stupid”.

Ian clenches his jaw, looking as if he is thinking about something very difficult, and then, while barely looking at him, finally says slowly, “Yeah…yeah I’ll wait Mick”. He gives Mickey one hard final glance before hanging up the phone, and leaving.

The way that he says it breaks something inside of Mickey, as he realizes that Ian _did_ lie to him. That he only said it because Mickey asked him to. He bites his lip to keep himself from crying like a little bitch as he hangs up his receiver, Ian now gone from sight. He just can't afford to get down in here, has to think positively. 

So... Ian can’t wait forever. Okay. There has to be some way to get his sentence shortened... and that’s gonna be the plan.

As long as Ian still loves him, there’s a way. There’s always a fucking way.

That’s all he thinks about as he heads back to his cell.

 

That night, he can barely keep his hands off of himself, as he waits for Damon to start breathing more slowly and deeply, indicating that he’s fallen asleep.

Mickey is still turned on after finally seeing Ian. The conversation had been painful and confusing, but Ian had been right there in front of him… his dark green eyes, his beautiful lips, after weeks of not seeing or feeling them.

He prefers at least some level of privacy, knowing that if he’s asleep, his cell mate isn’t just going to be sitting there above him, listening to him jerk off.

As soon as he’s sure Damon is asleep he licks the palm of his hand several times, after gathering an excess of saliva into his mouth.

He gasps slightly at the sensation as he wraps his hand tightly around his cock. He can’t believe it’s been a few weeks since he even _masturbated_ , but he’s been too fucking stressed and too fucking angry to even feel aroused at all, until today.

He closes his eyes and pictures Ian sitting in front of him only hours before, as he strokes himself vigorously. He tugs without mercy, not bothering to waste time with a slow build up.

The last thing he thinks about before he violently comes is Ian’s smile, and the flash of his green eyes.


	4. Catharsis

The next time Mickey is told that he has a scheduled visitation, only Svetlana shows up.

He wrinkles his forehead in confusion at her solo appearance, and the second she puts the receiver up to her ear he blurts out, “Where’s Ian?” She hardens her pretty green eyes slightly before answering with, “Orange boy not come here anymore”. “You told him not to fucking come here?”, he demands angrily. Jesus Christ why was this bitch _so bent_ on _destroying his Goddamn life,_ from the moment he fucking met her?

She shakes her head vigorously, “No. He says this”. Mickey, surprised, deflates a little. “Why?”

He still didn’t really believe that things could actually be over between them, regardless of the way Ian had acted during their last encounter. They’d been through too much to give up this fucking easily, and there was no way Ian could just pretend Mickey didn’t fucking exist for the next eight years, either.

Svet looks a little uncomfortable, as if she is torn between being straight up with Mickey like she usually is, and not wanting to hurt him. That’s pretty fucking concerning, considering their relationship. He presses her for answers when she doesn’t say anything, “Is he gonna visit again?” She shrugs, “I have no way of knowing this, Orange boy does not come to our house anymore”.

 _Where the fuck is he then?_  Mickey wonders, before rudely saying, “Well _find out_ and fucking tell me”, and he grits his teeth as he does, feeling like she is probably fucking lying to him. Ian was probably just fucking busy today or not feeling well, or maybe his bipolar disorder was acting up again.

Svetlana mutters something back in Russian under her breath and he rolls his eyes in frustration at her usual response, “I don’t know _what the_ _fuck_ you’re saying”.

 

Mickey is back in front of his counsellor a few days later, who’s name he finally fucking remembers (Dr. Howard), relaying this annoying conversation back to him, hoping that he can clear it up for him a bit.  

“Is it possible that Ian no longer wants to continue the relationship?” Dr. Howard asks, raising an eyebrow in concern at Mickey’s story and his obvious agitation over it.

Mickey shakes his head vehemently, “Wha- no! I mean, he tried breaking up with me right before I was arrested but there’s no way he meant it, he was fucked up then, and depressed. Besides, he said he would wait for me when he visited…” Mickey’s confidence trails as he reaches this last part, and he decides to leave out Ian’s obvious discomfort with being asked to wait, and his following unconvincing promise to do so.

“Well, maybe he didn’t want to make things harder for you. I’m sure he still cares for you Mickey, but in cases like these it’s very common for relationships to come apart. Especially considering that it was unsteady even before your arrest”.

The doctor’s not saying this to be mean, but the words still sting. Mickey feels his shoulders slump slightly, and he raises his hands in confusion, trying to make sense of this, “He’s my fucking soulmate, man. All that shit. What do I have to do to get him back? How am I supposed to do that while I’m _fucking stuck in here_?” Mickey can’t believe it but he actually doesn’t mind this guy, crazy doctor or not. At least he finally has someone to fucking talk to about this shit. They’re supposed to be able to help, right?

Dr. Howard looks at him sympathetically, and for once the expression doesn’t anger Mickey like it usually does when it’s directed towards him, “I can’t answer that for him Mickey, I really don’t know”.

“But there’s fucking hope, right?” Mickey demands, like this guy has all the fucking answers and just won’t share them.

The therapist smiles reassuringly, “Of course. There’s always hope Mickey, and you can hold onto that. That’s yours to keep. People sometimes come apart for _half a lifetime_ and still find their ways back to each other, if they both want to.  But in the mean time, if it’s what Ian wants, you have to let him go. You can’t force him to be with you”.

Mickey feels his tired eyes growing heavy, from both the weight of the conversation and the lack of sleep he is still experiencing, and irritably brushes one of his hands across them.

Dr. Howard had finally told the prison guards that he didn’t find it necessary for Mickey to be handcuffed during their appointments anymore either. Finding someone that didn’t automatically think he was a piece of shit, was refreshing. The trust he had shown towards Mickey as they had progressed through the sessions went a long way towards him opening up during those sessions. Although, he probably never would have, if he hadn’t of felt so lost and confused about Ian.

The night before his next scheduled visitation arrives he caves, and taking the doc’s suggestion, he writes a letter for Svetlana to give to Ian, hoping that it will maybe help him feel that it’s possible for them to get through this together.

 

_Ian._

_I’m not really sure how to do this because I’ve never really written a letter to anyone before. The counsellor here (that they make me see, just so you know) told me to do this and I’m doing whatever the fuck I have to, to get out of here early._

_I get that it’s hard for you right now. It’s hard for me too man. So please visit me again. Seriously Ian, I might be in prison but I’m free if I got you._

_-Mickey_

 

He knows better than to get his hopes up, Dr. Howard had even gently reminded him not to, but he still feels bitter disappointment when only Svetlana shows up the next day for his visitation.   

Mickey tries to act like he doesn’t care, and just nods his head casually while Svetlana relays her lengthy instructions to him about taking care of Viktor’s next target, some poor bastard in cell block D.

But before she leaves, he slips her the letter underneath the glass. “Give this to Ian, ok?”

She shakes her head, her light brown hair falling around her angular face as she does, “Mickey, this is not good idea. He does not want”. Mickey feels bile rise in his throat, and swallows the nasty taste back down as she pushes the letter back towards him. “You need to let go. Orange boy move on by now”, she tells him firmly.

He cocks an eyebrow sharply, “What the fuck do you mean, move on? Is he fucking dating or something?”, he demands.

She smirks, looking amused at the thought, “If fucking is dating”.

 _Fucking Ian_.

Horny bastard. What the fuck was wrong with that kid?

Whatever, Mickey tells himself, ignoring his own bubbling jealousy. Plenty of ass in here. Two can play at that game.

He drops the letter in the garbage as he leaves the visitation room.

That night at dinner Mickey sits directly across from a redhead that’s even shorter than he is, and stares at him pointedly until the guy finally looks up, unable to ignore him any longer. The redhead sighs deeply, looking back at him with some annoyance. He’s an easy target by prison standards, and not bad looking either. He must already be used to this shit.

 “You. Me. My cell. Finish up, princess” Mickey says, jerking his chin towards the man’s tray. The guy doesn’t even try to argue with him.

It’s outside of lockdown hours when Mickey arrives at his empty cell with the redhead, with Damon probably off doing his own fucking somewhere else in the prison.  As he put it to Mickey, it’s not about being gay in prison. Just about getting your rocks off. His casual attitude towards it said a lot about how he easily accepted his cellmate being gay, “You just went the extra mile and fell in love with ass”, Damon had smirked.

“Bend over”, Mickey commands the redhead.

Mickey grabs his narrow shoulders as soon as he does, and pushes into him almost immediately without warning, causing a slight shriek to emit from the other man. “Don’t pretend that hurt, you’re loose as fuck”, Mickey grunts meanly. The other guy starts to say something in annoyance and Mickey puts one hand over his mouth, forcing him to shut the fuck up. He doesn’t want to hear his voice.

Mickey pounds into the redhead relentlessly and it doesn’t take long for him to finish.

He finds the same redhead the next day, but follows him back to his cell instead, unable to find privacy in his own as opposed to yesterday. He’s a lot gentler this time though, his anger towards Ian having dissipated somewhat since his release yesterday.

He rocks his hips more slowly into the other man, who moans gently in pleasure at the sensation. Mickey stares at the back of his head and his red hair through hooded eyes, and the words spill from his mouth without him meaning for them to, “… _Yeah Ian…take it_ ”.

The redhead starts to look back towards him in confusion at the exclamation, but Mickey closes his eyes so he doesn’t have to see his face.

 

His bitter anger returns somewhat during his next counselling session though, the distraction from it having been very short-lived.

“Ian doesn’t want my letters”.

Mickey says this accusingly towards Dr. Howard, as if it’s somehow his fault that Ian is acting this way. The hurt extends entirely beyond the fucking letters, but Mickey of course would not readily admit to that. “I’m sorry to hear that. You can still write them anyways, you know, just for yourself”. The look in Doctor Howard’s eyes suggests he knows that it hurts anyways, even without Mickey telling him it does. It’s pretty clear to him that Ian is the only thing Mickey really cares about, after he refuses to talk about nearly anything else while in his office.

“Why the fuck would I do that?” Mickey sighs, exasperated.

“It’s cathartic”. 

“Speak fucking English Doc”.

Dr. Howard tries not to smile at his comment, “It helps to release pain, and frustration. It’s an exercise that I’d like you to work on. If you like, you can even bring the letters to our appointments, and we can discuss their contents together”, he adds.

Mickey chews the inside of his cheek, “I’ll think about it. Keeping writing them I mean. I’m not gonna show em to you though”. There were a lot of things Mickey would only ever be able to talk to Ian about, and regardless of whether he would write them down or not, those things would remain private.

 

Late that night, as Mickey lays in his small and uncomfortable bed, he hears something skittering loudly around on the floor of his cell.

He rolls over in confusion, to look for the source of the noise, and then squints his eyes down towards the small moving shape that he spots on the floor.

It’s a big fucking mouse, or maybe a small fucking rat. He stretches down to pick up one his work boots from beside his bed and chucks it at the thing. Whatever it is, it takes off after it squeaks loudly in protest.

“Yeah fuck you too” Mickey says, yawning. He jams his hard pillow over his head again, and tries once more to find sleep.


	5. None Of This Will Make Us Change

_Ian,_

_It’s been a few weeks since you visited me here._

_Svetlana said she doesn’t know if you’ll be back, and that you don’t visit them anymore. I don’t know if you fucking meant what you said about waiting, but I hope that you do. You can fuck other guys if you need to in the mean time, just don’t fall in love with anyone else, alright?_

_Because I’d wait for you Ian, I would always fucking wait for you._

_-Mickey_

Mickey rereads his own scrawled and spidery handwriting once, and then crumples the letter into a tight ball, tossing it across his cell into the toilet. It lands with a faint splash.

Mickey felt like he was going a little crazy not being able to talk to Ian anymore, and not knowing what was going on with him either.  Was he okay? Was he taking his medication? Was he safe from Sammi, or anybody else?   _Why didn’t he visit?_

None of it made any fucking sense to Mickey. They had been so happy before Sammi went and fucked everything up. He thought of the date that Ian had wanted to go on, such a simple fucking thing. Mickey couldn’t believe he’d never even thought of it before, but now…now he would have to wait _eight fucking years_ to even _ask_ Ian on another date.

Mickey turns 20 in prison a few weeks later.

He doesn’t even realize that it _is_ his birthday that day. He’s laying on his bunk, bored as hell during lockdown, with his head awkwardly turned to the side, watching Damon toss an old hackey sack around to entertain himself. After some time spent doing this, a familiar face shows up unexpectedly, and the man stands outside of their cell, waiting to be acknowledged. 

“Doc?” Mickey leans upwards while balancing on his elbows, looking in confusion at the man standing outside of his locked cell.

Dr. Howard raises a hand in greeting, and then places it back down on one of the metal bars in front of himself. “I’m on my way to see another inmate just down the block now for a scheduled assessment, but I just wanted to stop by and say happy birthday while I’m here”.

An odd feeling settles in the pit of Mickey’s stomach, “It’s my birthday? Uh… thanks, I guess”. The thought flashes across his mind that maybe Ian could have made a fucking exception, just for today, and visited him. Would have been nice.

Dr. Howard smiles, “It’s on your personal file, April 13th. Have a good one Mickey”. He leaves the cell with another friendly wave, clearly not realizing his news has left Mickey feeling like shit. His birthday was never a big deal back at home either, but it’s sort of an unkind reminder of Ian not giving a shit now that it went completely unrecognized. He couldn’t have even sent a fucking letter?

Days had begun to blend together here after the first couple of months, and he would have eventually realized that his own birthday had passed, but now here it was. Today. And Ian probably didn’t even care.

Damon waits until the doctor is gone and then reaches under his mattress, revealing a well hidden joint that is now pinched between his fingers. “Happy birthday man”, he offers it to Mickey who accepts it gladly, eager to numb his mind a little. Damon continues as Mickey looks around himself for something to use as an ash tray, “You’re an Aries, man. Ram. No surprise there, you’re always fucking headbutting stuff”.

Mickey laughs, suddenly amused by Damon’s surprising knowledge of fucking horoscopes, of all things, “Fuck off”.

“When’s Ian’s birthday?” Damon asks, tossing Mickey some matches. Mickey lights the joint, “Uh…October?”

Mickey can’t imagine for the life of him why he gives a shit but Damon clears it up for him, “Dude he’s a libra. You’re fucking opposites. Aries is fire, and Libra is air”. Mickey nods as if he gives a shit, still baffled that the Mexican hitman has a knowledge of horoscopes that could rival a teenage girls’.  Damon finally shuts the fuck up and goes back to tossing around his dumb hackey sack.

But Mickey continues absentmindedly thinking about what he had said. Fire and air.

Air could survive without fire…but fire couldn’t survive without air.

 

Months pass with no visits from Ian, and no word from him either. Every time a prison guard shows up at his cell to inform Mickey that he has someone coming to see him the next day for visitation, he asks them who it is.

“Your wife”, is the only answer he ever gets, and whoever the guard is delivering the news that day always looks surprised at his response, “ _Fuck_ ”.

Mickey doesn’t bother asking Svetlana about Ian anymore, partly because he’s worried about what she’ll tell him, partly because he thinks she probably won’t fucking tell him anything at all. She doesn’t even visit regularly anymore, only when there’s a new job for him to do. Sometimes she brings Yevgeny, sometimes she doesn’t. He wonders who babysits Yevgeny now that Ian won’t.

The jobs he continues to do for Viktor fill even him with disgust. He actually had to stab some poor fucker in the eye, Francetti, and never even knew why. The guy had screamed, bellowing in pain, and bled copiously onto the tiled shower floor afterwards, a sight that made Mickey’s stomach churn with nausea. He vomited when he got back to his cell, and he couldn’t get the sight out of the bloody eye out of his head that night. Not that he ever slept well anyways.

As the months stretched on, he did at least get a little more acquainted with his cellmate, Damon. Not because either one has a choice, but because they are forced to spend so much fucking time together. He’s a decent enough guy though, Mickey supposes. Sometimes they spot each other during workouts.

Damon had eventually shared that he had been arrested for doing his own jobs outside of prison, with the difference from Mickey being that he worked for a Mexican gang, not a Russian mob, and his current jobs involved drug smuggling, not placing violent threats. He tells Mickey that the gang he’s part of is his _family,_ his brothers, but Mickey has no connections to the Russians he works for. That’s another difference between the two of them. He does it because he needs the money, and because if he doesn’t fucking do it, someone else will be paid to take his own fucking ass out.

Easy choice.

Damon’s not exactly the smartest guy Mickey’s ever talked to, but getting along with him seems to pay off. Not just for being able to casually kill time talking during their lockdowns, but also because the other Mexican inmates, that Damon usually hangs around with, note their casual friendship and don’t try and fuck with him in response. To be fair though, Mickey gets the message across that he is not be messed with pretty clearly on his own over time.

 

Damon and Mickey are sitting on a table in the barbed wire fenced-in yard one hot and sunny afternoon during their free time, Mickey inhaling the smoke from his cigarette languidly as Damon talks about some Chica on the outside that he bangs. Monique or something. Mickey was pretty sure the girl’s name had changed at some point during the story, but he doesn’t point that out.

He blinks into the bright sunlight and watches as a tiny bird flies through the enclosed prison grounds, before passing clearly over the barbed wire fence without stopping. He blows a ring of smoke from his mouth casually, only half listening to whatever the fuck Damon is talking about now. And that’s when Damon suddenly turns the conversation on him, “Your guy waiting on you too, man?” Mickey just about chokes at the unexpected question, and he coughs up some smoke from his abused lungs as he thinks of how to respond.

Damon of course knew about Ian, after several months it’s not exactly possible to hide these things from someone you share a 6x8 cell with. Especially since he had seen Mickey tattooing “Ian Galager” onto his chest one of those very first nights. But Mickey had been avidly trying to push thoughts of Ian from his mind, as much as he could, because thinking about Ian only made things harder. But it wasn’t an easy task… he failed at it every fucking day.

“I don’t know man…I guess eight to fifteen years is a long time to wait” Mickey finally answers softly, but then adds with a little more humor, “I’ll just have to win his fine ass back when I finally get out of this shithole”. Damon shakes his shaved head and laughs, his dark eyes glittering against the sunlight, “What if he’s like, married or something by then? Do fags get married?”

He laughs stupidly at his own question. Mickey ignores the ignorance of it, but the question does flood him with an unexpected feeling of panic. 

What if Ian did _really did_ fucking move on? Enough so that he wouldn’t look back?

Mickey finally answers the question with conviction while tapping his dying cigarette out without any major concern, “Well I’m not gonna be in here for eight fucking years anyways man. Got a meeting with my lawyer coming up. Gonna get him to figure something out to get me out of this shithole early”. Mickey had requested another meeting with his lawyer the next day after Ian had visited, certain there had to be something else he could do, and he’d been waiting to hear back from him for some time.

Damon looks back at Mickey uncertainly, pity lining his dumb expression.

 

“Tell me about your son” Dr. Howard prompts, at Mickey’s next counselling session.

Mickey was just now reaching the point that he would sometimes talk about subjects other than Ian, but he snorts at this request, “If he’s my son”. Dr. Howard tries to get him to clarify, “You think your wife cheated on you?” It’s a simple but fucking stupid question, really.

“Did you forget I’m fucking gay?”, Mickey laughs darkly, “We’ve been over this. She’s about as far from a wife as you can get. I was forced to marry her by my fag hating father once I _supposedly_ got her pregnant. He forced me to fuck her in the first place anyways. Yevgeny might even be my dad’s kid, he was hittin her a lot more than I ever did”.

Mickey is momentarily pleased with the result of his nasty confession on the therapist, who hastily covers his brief, unprofessional look of shock. The doc might know a lot about him by now, but he sure as hell didn't know about that.

“Well…I suppose…that it’s hard to bond with him under those circumstances” the therapist finally says. “Yeah you could say that” Mickey shrugs, over the initial satisfaction of shocking the doc. “And he’s alright I guess… but I didn’t want a kid at all when he was born. I always thought that if I did ever have a kid, adopt or whatever, and that was maybe like, once in my entire fucking life, that it would be with someone I… someone I loved” Mickey says this part slowly and thoughtfully, as if he’s just realizing it himself.

“Someone like Ian?”

Mickey’s blue eyes dart up defensively, “Maybe…I don’t know”.

 

Mickey has a strange dream that night as he sleeps in his cell, tossing and turning on the small hard mattress.

He’s at the park near his house with Yevgeny and Ian. It’s a gorgeous and sunny day, and he feels happy, but when Yevgeny turns around eagerly to ask Mickey and Ian to play with him, he looks completely different from his usual blonde and chubby cheeked self.

Yev actually looks like him now, with a head covered in short black locks of hair. But his eyes are the exact same shade of green as Ian’s. He even has some freckles.

Mickey is dumbstruck as he stares at the little boy, his brain struggling to make sense of the sudden change in his appearance.

But as Ian runs forward happily in the dream, and picks the little boy up, swinging him easily into the air, covering him with kisses… it makes sense.

Mickey’s pillow is damp when he wakes up in the morning.

 

His dour mood gets even worse when he goes to his usual redhead’s cell for a stress releasing bang, and finds his cellmate in there with someone new, the redhead nowhere in sight.  “Where’s the redhead?” he demands.

“What, Pippi Longstocking?” His black cellmate looks up from his game of cards at Mickey.

“He’s gone, just in for a drug charge. Time to find a new bitch” he smirks, exchanging amused glances with his new cellmate, one he obviously gets along better with.

Mickey stands there for a minute with an open mouth, debating his severely limited options. He eventually leaves the cell in an angry storm, banging his fists against the metal bars as he does.


	6. Vicissitudes of Life

Mickey sits in front of a blocky television and tries to find some interest in the basketball game that’s currently flickering in and out of view on the small screen. His fellow inmates certainly seem able to, and exclaim at every pass, swear at every missed shot, while Mickey just tries to follow what’s happening.

His days are often mind numbingly boring, from the moment all of the prisoners are woken up at six in the morning, until ten or eleven at night, when they are supposed to go to sleep. He works out when he can, but it’s hard to get his hands on free equipment, and he hates doing push ups or any of that other shit without weights.

Some days he gets put on custodial duty, which is pretty fucking gross if he gets stuck cleaning washrooms or doing laundry, but it at least gives him something to fucking do during the day… fuck, even this half fucking broken television is pissing him off right now, which is ridiculous because he doesn’t even like basketball, but really, does everything here have to be absolute shite?

He sighs loudly to indicate his boredom without thinking, and the massive guy next to him turns his way with his dark eyes narrowed, glaring at Mickey, “You got a fuckin _problem_ , white boy?”

Mickey glares back at him, eyebrows raised, “Yeah, basketball is shit and so is this TV”. Mickey stands up and rather stupidly hits the television with the back of his arm, trying to get the screen to focus, but instead of helping, it flickers, and black and white static bars replace the screen instead of the game.

Shit.

“Are you _fucking kidding me?_ What the fuck man!”

Three or four different pissed off guys get off their chairs at once and come barreling towards Mickey, and he takes a few steps back in response, raising his hands in an attempt to appear innocent, “I was tryin’ to fix it alright? Calm the fuck down”.

Before he can decide who to headbutt in defense first, one of them lunges forward and shoves Mickey angrily, and he falls back and knocks into the TV, hard.

He hears the audio from the game return and he turns to look behind himself, seeing the screen has cleared, he shifts away from it quickly, his head aching from the impact. He then quickly swivels back around, ready to throw a defensive swing. But the three men, ready to fucking kill him only a moment before, are now happily absorbed back into the television again, one of their only links to the precious outside world.

“ _Hey_ , Milkovich!”

Mickey looks over towards the direction his name was called, and sees that a plump prison guard has at some point entered the room during the altercation, and is now gesturing at Mickey with his finger to join him. He picks himself up and walks over, dusting off his knees as he does. “What?”

The guard scoffs, “Are you fucking stupid or something?” Mickey looks back at the TV, “I was trying to fucking fix it. Hitting it always worked at home”.

“Yeah well you just about got yourself shanked, dumbass. You’re fucking lucky your thick skull fixed the thing when you landed on it. Go back to your cell before I write you up for instigating, you stupid piece of shit”. Mickey glances down as his jaw tenses, noticing his hands have slowly been balling into fists during the insults and the guard looks down and notices it too. He smirks confidently, “Touch me and you’ll be in the lockbox for a solid month, promise”.

Mickey grits his teeth in response, knowing he can’t even spit at this fat fuck like he deserves without getting fucking written up for it. Fuming, he punches the wall as he leaves the room, his knuckles making a sickening crunch as they come in contact with the solid concrete.

That night his hand throbs feverishly, as it slowly turns purple from bruising, and he has to bite into his pillow all night to keep from yelling out in frustration and pain. What he wouldn’t give for Ian to be here tonight, wrapping it for him, bringing him an Advil like he used to when Mickey was feeling like shit. Fuck, he’d give or do just about anything for that.

 

The day for Mickey’s legal appointment finally arrives, after making several requests to see his asshat of a lawyer again. He wonders how many of the requests the prison guards _actually_ filed for him.

He watches his lawyer enter the meeting room through narrowed blue eyes, and before he even takes a seat, Mickey rushes at him with his demand, “You need to get my sentence shortened”.

The lawyer puts his briefcase down onto the metal table and sits down slowly, looking at Mickey like he’s fucking crazy, “You demanded to see me, for this?” He actually sounds a little pissed off.

“I’m fucking serious. Do your fucking job, and get my sentence shortened” Mickey drives one finger into the metal table with conviction as he speaks, shaking his right leg in agitation. The lawyer shakes his dark head, “Mr. Milkovich, it doesn’t work like that. We got you the best deal we could with chance a of parole in eight years-” “I fucking need to get out of here sooner! He- I can’t wait”, Mickey’s body buzzes with anxious energy as he interrupts and then hastily corrects himself, something the lawyer doesn’t miss.

He sniffs, now looking extremely annoyed, “You are literally asking for something that is impossible. Your sentence is final, you do realize that, right? An appeal would be another waste of my _valuable_ time”. Mickey wishes he could strangle the fucking guy in response, but his hands are cuffed to the bar cemented onto the table right in front of him, keeping him just far enough away so that he can’t reach the man sitting across from him. Probably because it’s happened before.

“Do it. Send in the _fucking_ appeal, and contact me as soon as it comes through. I don’t care if the new deal is me doing community service or some shit for the rest of my fucking life, okay? Just do it” Mickey orders.

“Community service? _For_ _attempted murder_?” the lawyer looks back at Mickey like he’s some kind of a fucking idiot now. “Fuck off” Mickey says back with annoyance, and flips him off. The lawyer shakes his head as he gets up to leave, but Mickey knows he can’t ignore the request.

 

It’s damn near impossible waiting to hear from him again with the results of the appeal, but no more impossible than it already is being stuck in this shithole, without freedom. Without Ian.

Mickey goes back to stroking himself in bed at night without the redhead.

One night, with eyes closed, he pictures Ian’s soft, warm mouth gliding up and down his cock. He spits onto his hand some more to mimic the feeling, but it’s nothing compared to the real fucking thing.

He eventually comes into his hand, and slides off of his bunk into the dark to wash it off in the small metal sink above the toilet in the cell. “Better?” Damon laughs into the dark, startling Mickey, “Was getting tired of your bitchy mood”.

“Fuck off”.

 

_Ian._

_I’m working on it. Hang in there okay?_

_I hope you’re okay. How’s your…family and stuff?_

_Really miss you._

_-Mickey_

 

Two months later Mickey is told he has a phone call, and he is led in handcuffs to the public phone for inmate use to answer it.

“Hello?” he says into the receiver, doubtfully. He doesn’t really think it could be Ian, but you never know...

“Mr. Milkovich? It’s Daniel Simmons, your state appointed lawyer. I filed your appeal under harsh sentencing after our last meeting”.

Mickey’s heart leaps, “About fucking time! What did they say??” It might not be Ian on the phone, but this was his fucking ticket to getting out of here, to getting back to Ian… who couldn’t wait for eight fucking years. And he wouldn’t have to!

Mickey holds his breath and chews his upper lip nervously, purposefully avoiding eye contact with the guard who stands just two feet away, obviously listening. His lawyer however, instead of answering, lectures him sharply over the line.

“It’s a long process Mr. Milkovich, and convicted prisoners in your circumstances are at the bottom of the list. Frankly, you’re lucky it happened this fast”, he sniffs into the phone.

“Just fucking tell me what they said!” Mickey barely holds off from adding _asshole_ to the end of that sentence, because he kind of fucking needs this douchebag’s help.

“Well they denied it of course”

Mickey’s heart throbs with disappointment, and he tastes bile in his throat, as he barely hears the lawyers continuing explanation.

“It’s technically only a harsh sentence if there have been similar cases with substantially lighter sentences granted. There hasn’t been. And your case didn’t warrant legal errors at sentencing either, the judge didn’t make any mistakes during your trial”.

Mickey is silent, he can’t even think of what to say to this devastating news. For once in his life he doesn’t have a sarcastic remark, or even an insult, ready to find its way out of his mouth.

“I’m sorry Mr. Milkovich. Think of it this way, you’ve already served seven months of your absolute jail time. Thirteen, fourteen more of those and you can contact me again about your parole application. Eight years Mr. Milkovich, alright?”.

Mickey just quietly hangs up the phone. He scratches the stubble on his face sadly as the guard comes back over to recuff him. “Can I please just have a fucking… minute?” he asks almost inaudibly, looking down at the blurry ground. The guard obviously realized what the phone call had been about, and he answers with genuine apology.

“Sorry man, it’s policy”.

 

Damon lurches up from his bunk as Mickey re enters their shared cell, “Well?”

Mickey looks back at him through hollow and red eyes, and snaps, “Well what?”

He knows damn well what Damon is referring to, Mickey hadn’t been able to shut up before he left for his appointment... about really thinking he had a case, about thinking he was going to get out of here sooner. He had ignored every single one of Damon’s doubtful looks, who was already much more familiar with the adult prison system than Mickey was.

Damon sinks back down against his mattress slowly. Returning his dark eyes to the ceiling, he rests his hands behind his head before saying apologetically, “Guess it didn’t go well. Sorry man”.

Instead of answering, Mickey headbutts the concrete wall so hard he almost knocks himself out.


	7. Homesick Fade to White

“I’m gonna fucking _rot_ in here man, I’ll be almost in my fucking thirties before I get out!” Mickey blurts this out to his therapist while sitting in a chair across from him at his next mandatory appointment. The disappointing results of his appeal still had him spiralling through heavy feelings of bitterness and fear towards the amount of time now stretching unavoidably out in front of him.

“Prison is not a death sentence, you do not have to rot in here Mickey. You have all the time in the world to better yourself”.

“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?” he spits back defensively, feeling like that’s some sort of thinly veiled insult. The therapist continues calmly, ignoring Mickey’s tone, “When you were a child, what did you imagine doing when you grew up?” Mickey makes the connection of what the doc is getting at after a moment and calms down, “I dunno… I wanted to be a firefighter or a policeman when I was really little. Realized that was never gonna happen by the time I was like, eight”.

“Why couldn’t that have happened for you?” Dr. Howard asks, sincerely.

Mickey feels frustrated, “ _Because_ I had to work for my dad from that point on. Him and my brothers got me involved in all kinds of fucked up shit, taught me police were the enemy. You don’t get to have a respectable job, after you get a criminal record like mine hanging over you… Fuck, I didn’t even get through high school”.

“Mickey, I want you to remember that you are still a young man. You may have started out on a criminal path in life, but you don’t have to stay on it forever” Dr. Howard says this bullshit like he actually believes it. But Mickey never had any options, and it wasn’t his fucking choice to be on _any_ path. He never had any fucking choices, not when he was a kid, and he sure as hell didn’t have any now. Not while he was locked up in prison for the next eight years.

This conversation is draining him and he lashes out at the doctor, “Don’t pretend like you give a _shit_ about me! I’m another _fuck up_ that you get paid to listen to bitch about their shitty life, once you fucking force them to talk about it!” His nostrils flare, and his blue eyes flash with rage underneath dark eyebrows towards the man sitting in front of him.

Dr. Howard frowns back at him, his own eyebrows now severely arched. “Mickey, this is my job, yes. It doesn’t mean that I don’t care. The whole purpose of counselling is for you to gain inner perspective and control over your own emotion and actions, while maintaining a therapeutic alliance with me. Otherwise none of this will mean anything to you”.

“Maintaining a what?” Mickey is momentarily distracted by the cool response to his angry outburst and the unfamiliar term.

“Therapeutic alliance. We are in this progress of yours together, whether you believe it or not. Why do you find it so difficult to believe that someone can _care about you_?”

Mickey doesn’t answer, instead choosing to cross his arms firmly over his chest in defiance.

The therapist puts down his clipboard, obviously irritated. “We’re done here today. And frankly, we both know that my interest in your case is about more than just pay, so your outburst was a waste of both our times. You’re a unique individual, that’s been given a shitty hand in life, no argument there. But I want to help you turn things around”.

Mickey was surprised to hear the man swear, knowing that it was unprofessional, but he actually appreciated the cuss.

Did somebody finally fucking _get it_?

 

Mickey scratches his head with his thumb, sticking it awkwardly through his long hair to reach an annoying itch while he waits in line at the cafeteria.

He’d mostly given up on his appearance by this point, for more reasons that one. It was hard to get a decent fucking haircut in here for starters, two, not like Ian was here to see it anyways, and three, other horny inmates looking to stick it in somewhere tended to go less for scruffy inmates than clean cut ones. Enough of a fucking reason right there.

It’s finally his turn at the counter, and he looks in confusion at the inmates working kitchen duty who are now packing up their serving utensils rather than addressing him, “Uh, hello? Jobs not done yet boys. Can you give me some fucking grub please?”

One of them shakes his head, “Nah, we out man”. Mickey narrows his eyes, “What do you mean out?” He gestures behind himself, “There’s me and like thirty other guys behind me that ain’t gotten anything to eat yet”.

“I mean we fucking ran out. Supply order was fucked today. Get over it”. He turns his back to Mickey to wipe down the counter behind himself, and Mickey stares daggers at the back of his head. He stands there for a moment, biting his lip, trying to decide whether it was worth chucking his empty tray at the guy’s head or not. He can’t risk starting a riot though, that could just add more time to his sentence. He reluctantly walks away, leaving the next guy standing in line to do it for him.

A couple of weeks later, Mickey is staring at a list of class options, still finding it hard to believe that he’s actually doing this fucking shit.

First that counsellor had him writing fucking letters, and now this.

During one of their more recent visits he had told Mickey he was displaying some signs of depression, he’d been especially down after his disappointing appeal results, but that he would give Mickey some time to work on it before prescribing any medication. He knew damn well Mickey wouldn’t take any fucking antidepressants willingly, but Mickey knew he was at least lucky the guy gave him another option first. It was pretty standard for inmates to be drugged into being more complacent or calm.

The therapist had suggested that Mickey take one of the classes the prison offered, as a distraction, and as a way _‘to better himself’_ so he could gain employment more easily once he was out of prison.

Fucking bullshit. But there he was.

Mickey ends up signing up for a technical skills class, basic welding. It’s a small class, with very few inmates being cleared as a _low enough risk for violence_ to use the tools required. Most of them would make great fucking weapons, actually.

It sort of turns out taking the class isn’t at such a bad idea after all, it’s kind of nice to just work on something sometimes during the day, and he gets some money in his commissary account for doing basic repairs in the prison as needed. While under close supervision of course.

It also gives Viktor slightly less time to track him down, and get him to go wail on some poor bastard somewhere else in the prison, something that Mickey is getting pretty fucking sick of doing.

All in all, not a bad deal.

One day, when Mickey shows up for welding class the technical skills teacher tells them it’s a _free expression_ day. For them to explore the _artistic possibilities_ of welding. In reality he’s just hungover and just didn’t prepare a lesson for the day in time.

Mickey watches the other guys around him gather supplies uncertainly. One guy starts making a metal flower, for his fucking wife apparently, another starts welding a small, ugly, abstract thing. Mickey has no fucking clue what to make, but if he just sits there he’ll be told to leave. He finally ends up picking up some copper, rubbing it between his fingers, the reddish hue brings his mind back to Ian.

He softens the metal and then hammers it into a very small round ball, before shaping it again, after several attempts, into a crude heart. It’s awkwardly shaped, but sort of cool looking, he decides. Before the copper completely cools and hardens, he scratches into it with a screwdriver. _Ian_ on one side and _Mickey_ on the other.

He slips it into his pocket when he’s done, first making sure no one is watching, and then hastily welds some more copper into a weird crappy figure to hand in to the skills teacher at the end of class. They aren’t allowed to keep anything they make, and Ian doesn’t visit, so he can’t come pick it up either.

That night Mickey holds the small copper object in the palm of his hand, as he lays on his back in his bunk, rolling it between his fingers before letting it come to a stop in the center of his palm again in an oddly comforting routine. He traces Ian’s name over and over again with his tattooed finger, the copper warming slightly against his skin. He loves the reddish hue of the metal.  

Some day he’ll give it to Ian.

 

_Ian._

_I’m learning how to weld a bit in some class here. Bet ya never thought I’d go back to school did ya?_

_Haha…anyways, I’m not gonna give up on us, I will find my way back to you. Someway or another._

_I promise._

_-Love, Mickey_

 

By the time winter rolls around again, his time spent in prison now approaching a year, Mickey is physically stronger than he has been in a very long time, after having dedicated long hours to working out each day. His welding class had only run for two months, and he didn’t bother with another class after that, subsequently managing to somehow convince Dr. Howard that he was in no way depressed.

But his days were still long, and lonely.

Sure, he had Damon, who had his sentenced extended even longer for a bloody fight he started in the cafeteria one night… who the fuck knows why. His years in prison would now push past Mickey’s.

But Damon wasn’t Ian, he wasn’t even a real friend. They were just stuck in the same shitty circumstances. Svetlana had stopped visiting too, and he didn’t even have that to look forward to anymore.

He never thought that there would be a day he would look forward to seeing her, but spend enough time around murderers, thieves, and arsonists, and a Russian hand-whore starts to not seem so bad. He misses Yev’s chubby cheeks and smiling face too, and okay maybe even Svet’s tough, but familiar, attitude. Her request for a divorce wasn’t exactly shocking when it arrived, but he was somewhat surprised to learn that she’d found a better option as he happily signed the papers.

Frankly, he fucking missed just about everything back home.

He’d spent almost as much time in Juvie before as he already had in here, sure, but that was very different from being _here_ , and knowing there was no end in sight any time soon. He still wants to understand what the hell happened with Ian, and even after counselling, he still spends entire days when he’s sitting alone in his cell pulling apart their last conversations on his own.

Ian had said he was breaking up with Mickey before his arrest, but under the circumstances, and at the time, it had seemed that maybe that wasn’t a solid decision yet. Mickey was sure by the time Ian’s bipolar depressive episode had ended, he would’ve changed his mind. And Mickey had felt unbelievable relief at seeing Ian show up for that first visitation, felt like he could definitely get through this if Ian was going to support him through it.

He remembers vividly how shitty it felt when Ian told him he only came because Svetlana paid him to. Like a sharp needle had been stuck straight through his chest and somehow reached his heart. Underneath his orange jumpsuit that day, Ian’s name had burned in black ink, inflamed and infected but permanent. Like Ian was. Marked onto, and into him permanently. More than a year later, his tattoo was more than healed. But Ian’s comments and actions still stung.

Like when Ian had sarcastically asked if they were going to get married some day, and then practically scoffed at the idea. That had hurt and pissed Mickey right off.

He thinks about that too, angrily.

He had already known for a long time that he was in it for life with Ian, and getting married someday had crossed his mind before, once or twice maybe. He didn’t really feel like they _needed_ to though, his first marriage having left such a sour impression on him. It had been forced and fake, and what he had with Ian was freeing and beautiful. He didn’t want any connection between the two ideals. And did Ian really not think they would last?

After all those years of repeatedly finding their way back to each other? Ian was his ride or die, no fucking doubt about it. And he understood that eight years was a very long time… he did.

Fuck, every day without Ian stretched on and on, he could barely stand it. It was horrible here. There were still a lot of nights that tears leaked onto his hard pillow as he struggled not to make a sound, while he awkwardly held his arms around himself, ashamed, but trying to pretend they were Ian’s.

There were a lot of nights he wanted to die, too.

The only thing that kept him going was knowing that one day, one day he would be free, and he would see Ian again. That they could be together, and nothing would ever come between them again.

But the more time that went by without a single visit, or even any word from Ian, the more he began to worry that he might not be there anymore at all when Mickey finally got out. He might be 100% gone, completely moved on. Or he might be sad and lonely, waiting for Mickey right now. And Mickey wasn’t fucking there to protect him.

There was no way he could stay in this cell and rot for eight goddamn years. Just no fucking way.

He had to find a way to escape.


	8. A Sad Code

It might have seemed like the idea of a madman, who in the heat of the moment made the unrealistic decision to try and escape from prison, but it wasn’t.

Mickey was serious about the idea of getting out of prison, any way that it was possible.

For weeks, Mickey went from word of mouth to several inmates in the prison known for having ways to sneak things in past security, like drugs and paraphernalia, trying to squeeze any knowledge out from them on how to escape from inside these secure walls. What was viable, possible, even.

They all sneered at him, angered just by the question, “You think we’d fucking be _in here still_ if there was a way out? This ain’t fuckin prison break, dumbass”.

Damon sympathized with Mickey as he even eventually approached his cellmate in desperation, but he didn’t disagree with what the other prisoners had said either, “Man, I know how to disappear off the radar when you’re out on the streets, but getting out of here is the problem. It ain’t gonna happen. Impossible. Trust me, I wish I could get out too. You think I wanna be here for the next 20 fuckin years?”

Mickey shook his head at him, repeating words bitterly that he had once said to Ian’s family when they had told him he couldn’t take care of Ian when he believed that he could, “Don’t tell me what’s _fucking impossible_ ”.

Still, it began to feel that way. And Mickey grew more miserable, and more hopeless, as time went on.

 

“Would you do things any differently now, Mickey?” Dr. Howard asks him, crossing his legs while he sits across from Mickey at one of their appointments.

Mickey presses the pad of his finger against his nose, thinking. “Yeah, I guess. Not the Sammi thing, but other stuff” he answers, truthfully.

“Okay, then tell me. What would you do differently if you had the chance?”

The words then come sliding out of Mickey’s mouth, slick with bitterness and regret, “ _I wish_ I could go back man. All the way back to the fucking day I met Ian. And I wish I could beat the shit out of the scared pussy that pushed him away for so long. Tell him to fucking man up and tell Ian what he means to him from the fucking beginning”.

He thinks back to that terrible day he beat the shit out of Ian, when he told him to admit that he loved him among the abandoned and crumbling concrete buildings, and he feels sick. He fucking hates himself.

Dr. Howard doesn’t seem to be following his self-hating train of thought, “You know what they say, hindsight is 20/20. But don’t beat yourself up over it…it’s the butterfly effect, if any one little thing had happened differently, it would change every single moment that came after it”. Dr. Howard’s way of excusing things as if they are just so fucking simple sometimes lights up Mickey’s anger, as he continues to unwillingly picture in his mind the very moment his boot had contacted Ian’s chin grossly with a vicious kick, and blood had sprayed out, Ian groaning in pain from the impact.

He had been scared of his own life, fucked up and miserable and scared, and he took it out on Ian. And that’s what had broken him, made him sick…

What _good_ could have ever come from any of those actions?

Mickey practically bellows at the therapist as the guilt comes welling up inside of him, making him see red. “I wouldn’t even be in here right now if it wasn’t for I did! He would have never left for the army, wouldn’t have come back home all fucked up and bipolar! Sammi would have had nothing to rat him out for! I …”

Mickey trails off before he finishes, “… _I did this_ to him. I made him sick”. Mickey’s anger shrinks at the last statement as his voice cracks, and he grows quiet, suddenly feeling like he’s been hit in the head with a heavy brick. He feels stunned.

The therapist looks at him and says back very firmly, “Mickey, the difficulties in your relationship may have been a catalyst for Ian, but you did not force him to leave. You did not cause his bipolar disorder, and you cannot blame yourself for that. You are not the sole reason for any of those things. We like to think we have that kind of power in the world, but we don’t”.

“Then why did you ask if I would fucking do things differently?” Mickey says, gripping the arms of his chair tightly with frustration, trying to breathe through his thick and choking emotions. He’s fighting his familiar instinct to start throwing punches when he feels threatened, and it’s taking everything he’s got.

Dr. Howard doesn’t appear to feel threatened by Mickey’s obvious anger, “Because the point is not about just thinking about the mistakes you have made, but rather, if you have learned from them. If you have taken those experiences and grown from them. I would say hearing you talk just now that you did”. The therapist holds his hands out slightly as he said this, as if he is really trying to make Mickey understand what he is getting at.

Mickey shakes his head, a strange mixture of sadness and anger flooding his mind, “What makes you think that? I’m still here aren’t I? Still in fucking jail”.

“You recognize that you wish you had been able to be who you were sooner, and had been able to share that with Ian. You wish you hadn’t of pushed him away in the beginning. And you did stop pushing him away, you did the exact opposite. You might be here now, but you are already different even from the person who you were when you decided to seek revenge on the woman who hurt Ian”.

He is starting to go beyond Mickey’s own understanding of himself, but something he says sort of makes sense at the same time... Mickey still struggles with himself sometimes, he’s self aware enough to see that, but he also never would have broken away from Terry’s reign of terror if he had not been forced to at some point. Ian did that for him.

If he hadn’t of been forced to see what life without Ian was like, he might not have realized just how much having him in his life really meant.

His unsent letter that to Ian night is very short, and the ink smudges as he writes it, the paper slightly damp.

 

_Ian… I really fucking miss you._

_I don’t know what else to say anymore._

_I don’t know what else to do._

_-Mickey._

 

A month later, a new prison guard is hired for Mickey’s cell block, after another guard’s temporary contract had ended.

He felt sorry for her as soon as he saw her, that she was here at all. She looked delicate, not very tall, with soft and light brown curly hair, and a kind face. She was quiet too. Didn’t seem like the kind of person that should work in corrections, especially not in a men’s prison. She flinched slightly when the men catcalled and jeered out to her. Mickey of course, never joining in.

But she seemed tough too in her own way too, and something about her seemed familiar.

He ends up speaking to her when she arrives at his cell one day to take him to his counselling session with Doctor Howard. “Mikhailo?”

She addresses him by his first time, something he’s not accustomed to from any of the other prison guards, who usually refer to him either by his completely dehumanizing correctional number, or if he’s lucky, “Milkovich”.

He shakes his head, “It’s Mickey”. She looks slightly apprehensive as he approaches and puts his hands outside of the bars in front of her, but he just waits for her to cuff them. He has no desire to give a nice girl any trouble, and he has no respect for any men who do.

They are walking down past the rest of the cell block towards the exit when some fuckin asshole calls out to her from inside his cell, “Come suck _my_ dick when you’re done with him princess!”

Mickey swivels his head towards the sound, even as the guard tries to encourage him to keep moving forward, and he spots the guy who had opened his big mouth, “Say something like that to her again and I’ll knock your fucking teeth out of your goddamn skull.” He glares at the man warningly through ice blue eyes, tipping up his chin aggressively as he continues moving away from the cell, as prompted by the jittery guard.

He’s not sure why he feels so protective over her, but he does.

When they are outside of the cell block and into the quiet outer hallway, she clears her throat, “You didn’t need to do that. I can look out for myself”. He cocks an eyebrow at her. Not in a challenging way, more so in an interested way.

“Sure you can. You work in this shit-hole, don’t you? Doesn’t mean you should have to put up with that shit, though”. He shrugs as he says this, almost apologetically. He wasn’t trying to make her feel weak or incapable.

She looks over and up at him, just a few inches shorter than he is, and he notices that her own blue eyes have softened, “Thanks”.

Mickey just smiles as if it’s no big deal in response.

He’s back in his cell that night, gritting his teeth as he listens to a new inmate in cell block C trying to sing some fucking showtune, his voice completely whiny and offkey, it’s fucking brutal. Mickey would rather go through water drip torture than continue listening to it at this point.

The other inmates are already moaning their complaints but the new guard doesn’t seem to be able to make him quieten down through hushed requests, and Mickey grows more irritated as the guy gets even fucking louder.

Finally, he gets up from his bed and goes right to bars of his cell, pushing his face against them to try and get a view of the fucking yodeler somewhere across the fucking hall from him. “HEY, SHUT THE FUCK UP, OR I’LL COME OVER THERE AND SHOVE YOUR FUCKING DICK DOWN YOUR FUCKING THROAT!” Mickey yells, and finally, the guy cans it, many inmates sighing in relief as he does.

“ _Fuck_ …” Mickey sighs, exasperated. He returns to his crappy mattress, his plans of thinking of a certain redhead while being in a certain mood, now completely ruined.


	9. November Was White, December Was Grey

“Hey”

Mickey walks casually into the cell he’d been informed he needed to pay a visit to at lunch that day, and as soon as the guy turns around to look at him in confusion, he rears back a fist and then slams it forward, feeling his knuckles get sliced by the guys’ teeth as they connect.

The guy stumbles backwards against the wall for just a moment from the impact, before he catches himself and charges forwards at Mickey with an animal like rage, Mickey managing to duck to the side just in time to avoid the impact of his entire body-slam, but not able to miss a wicked punch to the eye.

They both spin back around the second they recover from the impact, and then quickly lock their arms against each other, wrestling for both dominance and the upper hand in the fight. Mickey knows he can’t falter for even a fucking second, or he will very likely end up dead.

But that’s not why he’s here, to win some stupid fight.

He braces himself hard and then savagely headbutts the guy, hitting his throat and the bottom portion of his face hard, with his skull. The guy crumples and goes straight down to the concrete floor, grabbing at his throat as he does, struggling to regain air back into his lungs. Mickey aims a boot, and kicks the side of the guy’s head hard, another direct impact. The guy begins to lift his arms as if he might be surrendering, but Mickey doesn’t trust that shit.

Can’t risk it either way.

He crunches his boot down viciously into the mans face once more, and then spits off to the side. His chest now heaving from exertion, he crouches down towards the man laying on the ground gasping, who is now able to breathe, but is still struggling to stem the flow of blood from his abused nose.

Mickey pants, “If Viktor has to tell you one more fucking time to pay for your shit, it ain’t gonna be me paying you a visit next time. And you ain’t gonna survive it either, you understand me?” The guy doesn’t say anything but nods vigorously, and Mickey straightens up.

He leaves the cell without looking back.

 

He is almost back to his own cell when he approaches where the small female security guard is standing, watching over the cell block, and she looks up in him in concern as he passes. She points at him, “Inmate, what happened to your face?” she says, trying to mask her horror.

“Dunno, can’t see it”.

She sighs, shaking her head, “Come with me. I’m taking you for first aid”. Mickey tries to brush her off, saying he doesn’t need any fucking first aid, but she insists, and as a guard he has to respect her authority. As soon as they are out in the hallway and away from the other inmates she tries again, using his name, that she seems to have remembered from last time. “Mickey, what happened? Who did this to you?”

He laughs, “Why are you assuming someone did it to me, and not back to me?” He wiggles his fingers at her from his cuffed hands, emphasizing the FUCK U-UP tattooed onto them.

She stares at him for a moment, trying to decipher is he is joking. Whatever she decides, she can’t push the issue any further, as they then reach the medical office.

The nurse inside wipes the blood away from a scrape on his cheek, and then pats it with some burning antiseptic. He sees his face in the mirror and realizes the guards’ concern had been about his eye, not the cuts and scrapes. His left eye is rapidly purpling and beginning to swell. It’ll be a real shiner.

Workplace hazards, what can you do?

 

It takes a while but Mickey eventually realizes that guard sort of reminds him of Mandy. Not because she looked like her in any physical sense, but because she was strong.

But only because she’d been broken so many times before. That he could easily recognize in someone, being very familiar with it himself.

Anyways, she had been assigned to escorting him to all of his counselling appointments after the other guard who used to, quit, and he was always friendly enough to her while they walked to and from each one. They had easy conversations about a movie she had gone to and liked, or something unusual that was in the news that week, pretty simple stuff.

He learned that her name was Aurora, and that she was in her early twenties too. She had studied law for a while, but ended up dropping out to go and work when she couldn’t afford it anymore, and that’s how she ended up here. She never mentioned having family, or a partner. Not once.

Mickey never actually asked about her life but she seemed to like opening up to him for whatever fucking reason, and he didn’t really care. Was nice to hear about stuff that didn’t involve stabbing, shooting, drugs, raping, or stealing for once, unlike the shit that constantly flowed around the prison blocks. Even if just was twice a week, it was something a little more pleasant in his life as days continued to stretch into weeks, and then into months.

By the time winter arrived, he had noticed that Aurora began to walk him to his counselling appointments more slowly, obviously taking her time, but he didn’t comment on it.

_Ian,_

_Cold as tits out lately._

_I guess holidays and shit are coming up, and they serve some sort of shitty Christmas dinner here apparently. Why fucking bother? Anyways._

_Do you remember that time we were walking home in the winter and you pegged me so hard with a snowball that I fell into and broke some fucking snowman those kids were making in in their front yard?_

_Still makes me laugh._

_-Mickey_

Turned out the crappy prison style Christmas dinners served in the cafeteria were just as gross as Damon had promised him that they would be.

Mickey sat there and poked at a piece of rubbery turkey on his tray with his plastic fork in such disgust, that it took him a minute to actually realize that someone had approached him and stopped in front of his table.

He looks up. One of Viktor’s goons.

“What?” he asks irritably.

“Why have you not taken care of Cachurovskii? You have death wish?” the man stares at him, lips pressed into a firm line, anger creased into the lines on his face. Mickey tosses his hands up in annoyance, “Who the fuck is that? Look, Svetlana doesn’t fucking contact me anymore. So you need something done, you gotta tell me yourselves now”. The man is not amused, or apologetic. “Do it. Tonight. Or else”.

_Jesus Christ._

Mickey drops his fork back onto his tray and then carries the entire thing to the garbage, emptying it.

Time to go fuck up some poor motherfucker’s Christmas Eve.

 

Aurora eventually began to approach Mickey by February, while he sat and smoked in the yard in the freezing cold air, always choosing to sit off by himself somewhere to think about Ian, away from the other inmates. He didn’t really mind her company though. She would stand nearby enough so that they could talk, but also so that it looked like she was just supervising to anybody else that happened to walk by. Any sort of _obvious_ friendship could get them both into trouble, but he felt there was some sort of friendship there.

By spring, he eventually came around and told her a little more about himself, about Ian, and why he was even in here. She listened sympathetically while he sadly told her about Ian, and she never questioned him about that, or anything else he told her.

She just believed him.

He liked that about her.

Sometimes, she would hand him an extra cigarette from her jacket when he finished his first one, and was ready to go back inside.

He thought that was interesting, because she didn’t actually smoke herself.

Not once.


	10. A Panacea

He didn’t mean to make her fucking fall in love with him.

He was surprised that she did. Especially considering everything that he had told her about Ian.

He realized that she was in love with him during a surprising encounter, after months of what he had assumed was just a close friendship, as winter and spring had passed. She was escorting him back from a counselling session at Dr. Howard’s office, when she suddenly told him to stop in the hallway. When they were clearly out of view of the security cameras, and there was no one else around.

He hesitated but did stop, and as she leaned in slowly he froze, watching her dewy eyelashes approach his face in slow motion. She pressed her soft lips against his and for a moment, after being alone for so long, he forgets himself and opens his mouth to the kiss, but then he quickly begins shaking his head, “Aurora, _Aurora!_ I’m _gay_ , you _know that_ ”. He feels guilty at her resulting crushed expression, she seems as lost and alone in the world as he feels. She apologizes dejectedly, “I know, I know! I’m so sorry, I just… lost my mind for a moment there”.

He pulls down his shirt a little and shows her his tattoo of Ian’s name, thinking it may comfort her in some way. “I’m not bullshitting you either, okay? I am gay, and I’m in love with Ian. You’re beautiful, and great. But I can never feel that way about you”. She nods, but they don’t speak another word to each other, as she leads him the rest of the way back to his cell.

 

Mickey makes a very stupid mistake that night in his cell, and a very big one. He’s writing one of his letters that he won’t _actually send_ to Ian, and for some dumb fucking reason he decides to write down that he’s looking for a way to escape, desperate for Ian know that he is, really trying.

 

_Ian,_

_I told you I’d find my way back to you._

_I meant it, I don’t want to live without you._

_I’m gonna find a way to break out of here, and be with you again and_

Mickey’s letter writing is interrupted as two guards suddenly enter his cell, Aurora being one of them.

His eyes widen slightly in horror before he manages to mask his panic, as he realizes they are doing random bunk checks, and will be checking the entire cell for any hidden contraband. “I’ll do the mattresses, you read whatever he’s working on there” the other guard says to Aurora, nodding a head towards Mickey’s letter as she begins to rumple the sheets and mattress where Mickey sleeps.

They thought he was writing a letter home, and they did have a right to screen any mail. If they read anything about him trying to escape, he would be screwed. It didn’t matter if it was feasible or not, something like that was taken as seriously as a death threat on one of the guards. Aurora puts a hand out for Mickey to hand her the letter, and he very slowly hands it to her, knowing he is about to be thrown in maximum security. He had absolutely fucked up, he would _never_ get out of here now. It's all over now.

Aurora reads the letter while the other guard moves onto Damon’s mattress, having found Mickey’s satisfactory. Her eyes flicker upwards towards Mickey as she finishes it, and he stares back at her tense and full of fear.

But she just folds the letter and hands it back to him, concealing what’s written on the inside as she does. “All clear, you?” the other guard looks to Aurora as she straightens up from the mattress.

Aurora tears her gaze from Mickey back to the other guard, “All good”. Mickey breaths a shaky sigh when they finally leave his cell, and he tears the letter into tiny fucking pieces before he flushes it down the goddamn toilet.

He is surprised, and a little worried, when she approaches him in the yard the next day. “You shouldn’t be here” she says, shaking her head sadly. There was a time he would have shot back a nasty retort at being told to leave, but it’s not in him anymore. And he practically fucking owes her his life after she spared his sorry ass yesterday, _God was he fucking stupid._

“I can go, I’m sorry”. He gets up to go sit somewhere else in the yard, brushing his pants off, and she almost reaches out to stop him before she catches herself. “No, I mean, you shouldn’t be here…” she looks around pointedly at the compound, the high fences. “…You should be with him”.

He shrugs, at this point he had pretty much accepted his shitty fate, a life without Ian. “Yeah, I know”. She looks at him earnestly, “I’ll help”. He can’t believe the words that have come out of her mouth, and has to hear them again, shaking his head as he asks, “…What the fuck did you say?”

Something must be off with his fucking hearing.

But she repeats it, clear as a bell, “I’ll help you. I thought about it a lot last night after I read your letter”. “Help me...?” he repeats back dumbly, still in shock. The fuck does she mean? She nods, and barely mouths the word, “escape”.

He doesn’t believe her at first, thinks she is trying to get him in trouble for rejecting her, but she remains firm in her offer, and if she wanted to fuck him over she could have easily done so the day before. For the first time in almost a year and a half, he begins to feel hope again. A familiar fire begins to burn inside of him again, as he thinks about the possibility of seeing Ian. Of being free.

It does take time, as they discuss logistics and probabilities together. She’s not a stupid woman, and she knows the system well, although from a very different perspective than Mickey does. But she also knows how dangerous this could be for both of them. How much they are both risking. But something about Mickey, and his story with Ian, has compelled her to help, and he won’t question that. He can’t. He needs this.

“You’ll have to run too you know, for helping me" He warns her quietly one day, while she is slowly escorting him back to his cell back from the doctor’s office. “No, I won’t. I’m going to tell them that… that I fell in love with you. That you promised me we’d be together. I’ll play the stupid, lovesick guard”. She laughs gently at the last part.

He shifts awkwardly a little bit, feeling uncomfortable, “I’m really fucking sorry, if I ever made you think-“ She laughs with more strength this time, “It’s okay Mickey. I do care about you, a lot, but I’m not holding anything against you. You belong with Ian… I can see that. This way I’ll get fired, but nothing else about my life has to change, really. This isn’t the career I dreamed about for myself anyways”. She smiles at him sadly. He nods slowly, understanding, and says “Tell them what you need to, I’ll go along with whatever you fucking say if I ever have to talk about it. You deserve better too”.

In some ways, he knows that he’ll miss her. Finally having someone on his side for the first time in a very long time. He hasn’t had a real friend in a very long time either. Other than maybe Dr. Howard, but Mickey doesn’t hold the same trust for him. He can’t of course, and when the therapist comments on his mood change at their next appointment he can’t help but smile, thinking of the deep secret he now holds. Although part of him does wonder what the doc would say if he just said he was gonna escape prison and be with Ian, no matter what anyone said.

“I feel…hope. Like you said, I can keep that”. The doctor smiles back at him, “Of course you can. It was a long and hard progress for you, Mickey. But I’m proud of you. You worked very hard, and it shows in your new attitude”.

Mickey waits in the yard later that same week, smoking a cigarette impatiently, for Aurora to arrive. It’s summer, and June bugs sing lazily in the sunshine, filling the yard with a slightly irritating buzzing sound that reminds Mickey of a computer lab.

Aurora finally does show up with Damon in tow, as planned.They had realized that Mickey’s cellmate had to be let in on the plan somehow, there way just no way to do it without him. It would be too easy for him to notice that something was odd, and if he was left behind, there was no doubt in their minds that he would be pissed off enough to have no problem snitching. Before Mickey had a chance to get away.

“The fuck is this?” Damon asks, looking from Mickey to the security guard, warily. “It’s cool”, Mickey raises a hand reassuringly, “Listen, I need to ask you something. You still able to get us off the radar if we could get outta this place?” Damon becomes enraged in a matter of seconds and advances on Mickey like he’s going to rip his fucking throat out, taking the question in the completely wrong way, “You fucking rat on me you motherf-“

Aurora puts her hand on her taser, “Stop, now.” She says this strongly and firmly, grabbing Damon’s attention. He hesitates, noting where her hand is, and Mickey jumps at the opportunity to get his point across. “I got the way out man. I got it! She’s gonna help. But I need you for the second part. You in?” Mickey tosses his cigarette to the ground, his blue eyes now burning, he stares at Damon with absolute seriousness.

Damon’s rage turns into surprise and then into confusion as he looks at both of them like this is some kind of a fucking joke, that they will eventually say ‘just kidding!’

But they don’t.

“You fuckin serious?”

Mickey is getting impatient, “Yes I’m fucking serious” he snaps, “Yes or no?”

“Yes, fucking yes”.

A smile curves across Mickey’s face, and his blue eyes shine.

“Alright then, let’s fucking do this”.


	11. The Majordomo of Cook County Correctional

“You know we ain’t going back home, right?” Damon asks Mickey that same night, when they are both back in their shared cell.

They sit about an inch apart on the bed, whispering so quietly that they can barely hear each other over the rest of the noises in the prison.

Exactly the way they need to, to ensure no one else hears them.

He clarifies, “We ain’t gonna be able to stay there. Cops are gonna come looking and eventually get us, and we’ll never see the light of day again if they do. Mexico is our best option”.

Mickey nods, not having expected anything else. It didn’t really matter where he was, as long as Ian was there with him. Still, some strange sadness pulls gently at him at the thought of never being able to return home.

Damon seems to notice and smiles, now friendlier towards Mickey since he was brought in on the plan, “You’ll like it there. Sun always shines in Mexico, fuckin beautiful beaches man”. He probably doesn’t realize he was only brought in on it because he might fuck it up for Mickey if he wasn’t.

Mickey looks up at his promise anyways though with interest, “Beaches?”

_“Sí hombre,_ amazing ones".

Mickey sits inside of an empty and unfamiliar cell just a few days later, waiting for one of it’s inhabitants to show up.

He has a vague description of the guy he’s supposed to be waiting for, who one of Viktor’s other employees had named as Egorov. He’s apparently got a massive scar on his skull where the hair has not been able to grow back, and both of his arms are covered in tattoo sleeves.

Egorov takes his sweet fucking time to arrive and when he does, Mickey is now impatient and further angered by how long he had to wait. Another one that apparently fucking owed Viktor something, not that Mickey was ever told any specifics about their grievances.

He’s a tougher opponent than any other one Mickey has had so far, and his significant advantage in height over Mickey doesn’t make it any easier.

Mickey is beaten just as badly as the other guy is, and by the time he leaves he is exhausted, bruised, and dripping blood. He collapses into his bed when he reaches his cell and passes out.

He is surprised when he is prodded roughly awake later the same night by an unfamiliar security guard. “What?” he grumbles, rubbing one of his sore eyes with his hand. “You need to come with me”. Mickey squints up at the unfamiliar face, “Why?” The guard frowns, glancing quickly up at Damon’s sleeping form on the bunk above Mickey’s before hissing, “You’ve been here how long and haven’t learned not to fucking question a guard?” Mickey sighs, this close to his escape he can’t risk getting in any sort of trouble and being forced to switch cells, or worse, end up at a higher security level. “Alright, alright”. He follows the guard out of his block and down another hallway sleepily, his brain still not fully awake, when three men suddenly leap out from a dark side hall that Mickey and the guard were approaching and grab him, one immediately covering his mouth with a heavy hand.

Mickey struggles, now completely alert and panicked, he tries to yank both of his arms out of the multiple grasps and then bites the guys hand, hard. The only response he gets is to be viciously clocked in the side of the head, and he blinks rapidly as spots appear across his eyes. He fuzzily sees the guard nod his head at the men and then turn around to return back to where he and Mickey had come from.

Mickey is forced further down the hallway, kicking and struggling the entire time with everything he’s fucking got, but there’s just no way for him to get any sort of hand over the other three inmates. His eyes widen as he realizes they are bringing him into a now abandoned washroom during the hours of the night, the same one where he had stabbed Joe Francetti in the eye, for Viktor.

It’s dark, dimly lit by only a single light that one of them switches on as they throw Mickey inside, closing the door behind themselves. “What the fuck is this?” he tries to demand, but his voice is strained and a little shaky, he is so fucking scared of what they will probably do to him. And he doesn’t even know why they're doing it.

Not one of them says a word, instead the three of them brutally beat him down until he hits the ground, wasted from heavy punches and well aimed kicks. And then they step back, heading out of the room as Mickey pants in pain and confusion at their retreat. Until someone else enters the room the moment they leave.

It’s Viktor himself.

He’s never dealt with Mickey directly before, and he stands there for a moment before he says anything, his strong jaw jutting out as he looks down on Mickey. Viktor is completely alone for once, with none of his henchmen trailing after him, but he’s just as intimidating when he stands alone, with an air of confidence and strength hovering about him that is undeniable. 

“After several successes, you have disappointed me Mikhailo”. He says this very simply, as if Mickey should already know what he is talking about.

But Mickey is confused, as he looks back at Viktor from behind his swollen and bruised eyelids. Yeah, he had left the fight in just as rough shape as the other guy, but he certainly exerted enough force to get his point across.

Viktor continues, “Egorov entered my cell on this night with a hand-crafted shiv, and attempted to take my life, leaving me with no choice but to strange him to death myself. You failed to deliver my message”.

Mickey hastily points at himself, his bruised body covered in brutal cuts and scrapes, “I _did_ deliver the message. I was told to beat him, not kill him! How the fuck was I supposed to know he would go after you?”

Viktor looks down at him as if he is stupid, “If you had done the job right, he wouldn’t have. Fail me again Mikhailo, and you will be the next on my list. I am feeling generous tonight, so I will let you live. For now”.

He leaves the washroom after he says this and Mickey feels a nervous shudder ripple through his throbbing body.

One more fuck up like that, and he won’t survive long enough to ever see Ian again. He’s running out of time to escape.

The next day, still feeling extremely stiff and sore, but relatively able to function, Mickey goes to the prison library for the first time in the entire history of his incarcerations, never having had an interest in books before. They were too quiet, and unchanging, but he had had an idea last night, as he tried to picture the beaches of Mexico in his mind.

Mickey had been physically and mentally exhausted after his day filled with beatings, but he wanted some sort of comforting image in his mind before he finally fell asleep. The guard had been waiting outside of the washroom for Mickey when he finally came limping out, and had escorted him back to his cell in silence.

The dead inmate that had been found outside of Viktor’s cell in the morning was buried without much investigation. Viktor of course, had someone else who owed him take the fall on his behalf, and although the guards knew it was bullshit, they didn’t question Viktor.

Even they knew he was not a man to be crossed.

Mickey strolls down the aisles of bookshelves in the unfamiliar library until he finally finds a _‘World’_ section. He thumbs across each book resting in the slanted row, searching through the odd assortment of mostly donated works as he walks down the line. Finally, his bruised fingers land on what he is looking for, and he pulls the tightly wedged in book out from its place in the shelf.

_“The Beauty of Mexico”_

He flips through the book for a moment until he reaches a picture of a beach and pauses. He carries the book over to a chair carefully and sits there, staring down at the picture, wanting to burn the comforting image into his tired mind. He needs something to hold onto.

_It looks like paradise_.

There is stunning clear blue water, and pure white sand is lining the long and curving beach. Palm trees are swaying gently in the mild wind, while a brilliant orange and yellow sunrise splashes a soft glowing light onto it all. Two empty wooden lawn chairs are in the picture too. Mickey touches the page, running his finger slowly over each rich detail, and then, stopping at the chairs, he pictures Ian and himself lounging in them.

He wishes he could rip the picture out of the book and keep it, but a guard has been eyeing him suspiciously this entire time, while taking in his battered appearance, so, fighting the urge to flip the guy off, Mickey reluctantly returns the book back to it’s place on the shelves.

It turns out he didn’t need the picture anyways.

Each night going forward, as he laid in his cell, he could clearly see in his mind Ian and himself, finally together, as he healed.

Happy. Free.

The brilliant sunshine beating down on them while they lay in the warm white sand, sharing a cigarette. Fucking on abandoned beaches, underneath the swaying palm trees. Kissing while they walked down the perfect beaches together, holding hands, putting back endless beers. Paradise.

It keeps him going while he waits.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 'Majordomo' is a word that stems from a Latin term, and means "highest official of the household"


	12. Hard on Myself

It takes a couple of weeks for Damon to arrange his half of the deal, and Mickey doesn’t ask for the details on how he does it. It’s better that he doesn’t fucking know, and it leaves less chance for either of them to let anything fucking slip, even by accident.

Mickey manages to get a job done to Viktor’s satisfaction in the meantime, and can breathe a small sigh of relief, managing to hold off another death threat for the time being.

Aurora’s part in the plan takes a little longer of course, because she is determined to get every detail exactly planned down to the minute with no room for error. It takes her weeks to time and record details of all of the security mechanisms in the facility impacting the best route of escape. But it’s better they take the time to get it right Mickey figures, they only get one shot at doing this.

She explains to them, it will only work on a night with a spot no other guards will be patrolling their block. It’s a fifteen-minute window max, where the other night guard takes a break and the halls near their block will completely empty. Jeff is the only security guard who goes to his car without fail each break that he has, and the employee lot is behind the building. A night with only the two of them scheduled is the only feasible option.

Mickey can’t argue with that, and at the time she relays this Damon is probably too stoned to either, because he just nods dumbly, looking at her through red and hooded eyes.

Finally, about a week later, she tells them there is an approaching night scheduled with just her and Jeff working their cell block. She tells Mickey and Damon that is most likely going to be the night, but that she will confirm the day of. Just in case anything changes.

_Ian,_

_Soon man,_

_I love you._

_-Mickey_

 

 

“You have a very low self-esteem Mickey”.

The counsellor says this to him after Mickey apparently fails to answer his previous question satisfactorily, _“What are some things that **you** like about yourself?”, to_ which Mickey had just laughed in response.

Mickey scoffs at the resulting comment, “I ain’t _some chick,_ alright?” He adds to this when the doctor raises his eyebrows at his statement, “I’m fucking fine, ok? I’m fine with who I am”.

But the last part comes out as a mumble.

Dr. Howard shakes his head, “I think there is a lot about you to like Mickey, and I think you underestimate yourself. We are products of the environment we grow up in Mickey, yes. Circumstances may have limited you before, but you are a smart man, and obviously one capable of great and selfless love. Not many people are capable of that, in my experience”.

Mickey is sitting in the Doc’s office during a normally scheduled counselling appointment, and he is alone in knowing that it’s probably the last time he will ever be in here again. Either he will escape within the next few days, or he will be caught trying to, and be sent to maximum security for the rest of his life, the efforts to _improve him as a member of society_ being abandoned by the corrections system in response. But the counsellor of course, doesn’t know of his escape plans.

The topic today has as per usual rolled back around to Ian, the doc had asked him to name some qualities Mickey admired in Ian, what he liked about him, and that was pretty fucking easy, _“He’s smart… brave, outgoing. Makes you feel like you fucking matter. Ian’s fucking amazing”._ The doc of course had then turned it back around and asked him what he thought the good qualities Ian had seen in Mickey were, to which he had hesitated in response. The doc tried to rephrase it with, _“What are some things that **you** like about yourself?”_ , and that’s when Mickey had just laughed.

Mickey doesn’t respond to the doctor’s opinion of him. He doesn’t know what to say. There’s a lot of circumstances, spanning over Mickey’s entire life, that led to him not thinking much of himself. The most recent one was probably the worst. But the doc is fucking good at his job, and he knows what Mickey is thinking about now.

“It’s hard, losing someone you love. It doesn’t mean you can’t be loved again though. Or love someone else”. Mickey shakes his head adamantly, “I just can’t let him go…and, I don’t want to. I don’t want anyone else”.

“Loyalty is very admirable Mickey. But you need to think about what’s best for you, too. Someone appreciating you, that’s what every good person deserves. Do you feel like Ian appreciated you?”. Mickey rolls his eyes and ignores the last part; this guy doesn’t fucking know Ian. “You think I’m a _good person_? I’m in here for attempted fucking murder”.

“Good people are capable of committing bad, even horrible, actions. We are emotional creatures Mickey, capable of both handing out both great love and great harm. I think we’ve reached a point in your counselling where we know that your motivations for committing a crime are not in any sense for the mere thrill of doing so, but because you feel you have a point that you have to prove”.

Mickey thinks about his past ‘crimes’, whether he was ever caught and charged for them or not, and it’s probably fucking true. He was never afraid to throw the first punch, but he didn’t really ever beat on someone for no fucking reason. Jealousy, anger, defence…many things had fueled his attacks on people, or his crimes in general. Rarely was it pure boredom.

Protecting his neighborhood, by shooting up the new expensive coffee place that threatened its old inhabitant’s ability to stay there. Stealing because there was no other food in the house for him or his siblings. Wanting to physically harm anyone who hurt his sister Mandy, in any fucking way. Providing for his family, by selling stolen goods and moving drugs.

Wanting to torture Sammi, so she would never hurt Ian again.

Dr. Howard continues as Mickey sits in silence, mulling this over.

“At the end of the day Mickey, if you believe you are a bad person you will feel no reason not to do bad things. Good people are held accountable to their actions by their own conscience. I understand that you have had the need to commit crimes in the past, to survive. But going forward you need to strongly consider the alternatives. It’s the only way your life will change when you are out of prison”.

Mickey frowns, he can’t imagine what a life without crime would look like for him. It was all he had ever known, ever been surrounded by since he was a kid. The alternatives thing, yeah, he would have to work on that. If he wanted to stay out of prison once he finally got out of this shit hole.

And he did, he never wanted to come back here again.

But some things can never change.

“We are who we are, we do what we need to” Mickey finally says, standing up and putting his wrists together for the security guard, as Aurora enters the room to recuff Mickey, his last appointment now coming to end.

Dr. Howard doesn’t argue, but instead, with an indiscernible expression in his eyes, simply nods meaningfully at Mickey. “Wait”, Mickey stops as he reaches the office door. Before Aurora shoves him forward out of the office to keep up with appearances, Dr. Howard peers up from his clipboard in response, “Yes?”

Mickey looks at him for a moment, “Thanks doc”. He nods at Dr. Howard and then turns away, ready to be led back to his cell in handcuffs for what he hopes is one of the very last times. It’s an unspoken goodbye, and he hopes that the doc understands why he does what he needs to do.

He feels like he just might.

During lock down hours the very next day, sooner than he would have imagined, Aurora approaches their cell as if she is doing another scheduled inspection.

As soon as she has both Mickey and Damon’s undivided attention she looks around their cell and says, “Alright. Looks good you two. You’re good to go”.

And that’s the signal.

Tonight’s the fucking night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> One chapter left of "Inside Secure Walls" and then I will begin posting the second half of the series :) where Ian is involved more directly, and it's based largely around the last few episodes of season 7.


	13. Providence

Mickey never would have imagined that he could have fallen asleep on that last night, but he did. He’d spent the rest of the day after Aurora had signalled them pacing, working out, and trying to burn his overwhelming nervous energy. The mixture of physical exertion and anxiety must have drained him, because he doesn’t remember falling asleep at all. Just laying back onto his mattress when he was supposed to, and hearing Damon doing the same above him.

He jolts awake when he hears someone hiss hotly into his ear, _“Wake the fuck up Mickey!!”_ Damon’s face is leering an inch away from his own as he opens his eyes and Mickey immediately shoves him away with one hand. Damon clenches his teeth and jerks his head towards the cell door, where Mickey sees Aurora standing, her eyes wide as she bites her lip anxiously.

Awareness hits Mickey like a lightening bolt as he remembers what’s happening. He scrambles off of his bunk. Aurora glances around before saying, as confidently as she can, “Inmates. There’s a burst pipe in the Block A washroom and you two are needed for welding and sewage cleanup, you’ll need to come with me”. She says this loud enough for the nearby prisoners to hear.

Of the few nearby that may have woken from the mild commotion, none of the other men in the block give a shit, and are just glad they aren’t the ones chosen to clean up a nasty sewage spill. The excuse was perfect, as Aurora had known it wouldn’t raise any suspicion or concern from the other prisoners.

They walk about halfway down the cell block before Mickey suddenly remembers something, and mutters quietly, “Shit I forgot something, hold on”.

He dashes back to the cell silently as Aurora and Damon look after him with their mouths dropped open. He gropes under his mattress and quickly finds the small copper object he had hidden there. “Sorry”, he whispers as he returns, both of them looking like they want to backhand him.

They continue to walk back down the rest of the cell block as a group, as quickly but as calmly as they can. Gulping and sweating all the while, Mickey notices the other two appear just as agitated as he feels, with Aurora’s cheeks in particular being deeply flushed.

As soon as the entrance door to the cell block closes behind them, Aurora breaks into an even run, Damon and Mickey rushing after her towards the empty staff room. She yanks open her locker while they stand there in panic mode, frantic, and waiting for something to go wrong.

She thrusts a garbage bag at them, “Change into these”. Mickey glances inside the bag. Darker, more inconspicuous street clothes. He sheds his orange jumpsuit and quickly redresses, lastly pulling on a woolen hat over his now long and uncut hair while Damon follows suit.

“We got ten minutes before the van is here man, and they ain’t waitin”, he warns Mickey, while glancing at the clock hanging on the wall. He turns to the guard and she doesn’t hesitate, waving for them to follow, she rushes them back out of the staff room and through a continuing maze-like stretch of hallways and doors. “Least amount of security this way” she explains, her breath huffing.

The scuffed corridors of the prison are empty and silent as they avoid even going any near any of the other cell blocks, where there are more security guards patrolling throughout the night. Aurora checks her digital watch again, “Five minutes before Jeff finishes his break and heads back in! I need to be back there by then, and you need to be gone!” she whisper-pants. 

Adrenaline pumps through the three of them like an electrical storm, quickening their pace. Somehow, thanks to some unknown divine fucking intervention shining down on the three of them, it all goes without a fucking hitch. Aurora pauses to check her digital watch one more time before they throw open the last door, making sure the searchlight is focused on the opposite end of the yard.  

The door swings open to the dark and empty yard, and they leap down to the ground and begin tearing across the dewy grass until they reach the prison gates, all in less than a minute. The searchlight that does its rounds around the compound lazily is still currently focused on the opposite end of the yard, just as Aurora had known it would be after weeks of careful timing recordings.

The three of them press themselves up against the fenced gate tightly as Aurora fumbles to unlock it, succeeding right as a dark van pulls up hastily on the road in front of them.

Damon runs for it instantly, but Mickey hesitates for a second.

“Thank you. Seriously. _Thank you_ ”, he says hoarsely, kissing the guard on the cheek with unspeakable appreciation as his heavy heart swells with hope.

“Go get him” she smiles, and shoves him towards the van.

Mickey doesn’t need to be told twice. He darts into it after Damon, yanking the sliding door closed behind himself immediately.

He sees Aurora wait outside the gate for just a moment until the searchlight passes again, and then she slips back inside to make a mad dash back towards the building before it makes its next round. Their timing was perfect, and she _should_ make it back to her general area of patrol just in time, raising no suspicion from the other guard.

Her plan for the morning, which is not that far away, is solid. She is going to wait in the supervisor’s office for him to arrive to his shift and he’ll find her there in tears, seemingly spiralling deep into the stages of a mental breakdown, sobbing over the prisoner that she had helped to escape, only to be shunned in the end.

She’s a fucking angel on Earth, and Mickey thanks whoever or _whatever_ sent her his miserable way. He never could have done it without her. He just can’t believe their fucking luck. He never believed in God, but maybe he does now.

Mickey sighs deeply and shakily with relief, his entire body trembling as the van drives rapidly away from the prison.

Freedom.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Part two of this series, "Where the Ocean Is", is already pretty much written, and just needs to be heavily edited, so I will begin posting it soon. It continues right from where this final chapter left off :) Thanks for reading!!


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